


Blood Bank

by Coraleeveritas



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst and Fluff and Smut, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-06
Updated: 2016-04-27
Packaged: 2018-05-18 13:34:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 41,088
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5930302
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Coraleeveritas/pseuds/Coraleeveritas
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In spite of the world crumbling around him, there was something about her lack of beauty and grace that ignited a spark of recognition inside of Jaime, the surfacing memory of the first day he had seen her, his need for anything familiar causing him to shift forward in his seat.</p>
<p>Her eyes narrowed as he continued to find an inexplicable interest in the untold stories swimming in their astonishing depths, attempting to smother whatever spark was holding them both steady with an uncomfortably knowing smile.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> This is something that's been simmering away for nearly a year now and since I'm now just putting the finishing touches to the final chapter, there should be around twelve, it's ready to post :)
> 
> The whole idea of this fic is based around the song Blood Bank by Bon Iver and if you know the lyrics you may have some idea where certain things in here have come from.
> 
> As always, huge thanks go to RoseHeart for being a constant source of friendship and support. This fandom brought us together and she's now one of my best friends, who, I'm sure, I occasionally annoy by sending the same paragraph over and over again until it's perfect, lol. 
> 
> Anything you recognise doesn't belong to me, although all mistakes are mine and I must apologise in advance if I get any of the medical things wrong later in the fic as most of my knowledge in that area has come from one semester at uni and a teenage obsession with ER.

Over a lifetime there will always be days to be forgotten, those that stab at hearts and minds until the pain becomes too much to bear. There will be those that feel like the dawn will never come and the night stretches on and on into oblivion, ‘worst case scenarios’ the only option left to hang onto before the growing disquiet demands to be acknowledged. And isolated in a screamingly sterile hospital waiting room, waiting for his brother to dare anyone to stop him from running red lights, innocent blood drying on his hands, Jaime Lannister prayed to gods he had stopped believing in to give him just one day. Just one day he could wash away. He had stood by and watched his mother slowly waste away to nothing, his forbidden lover marry three times over, each wedding drawing him closer with the heady combination of contradictory words and actions. But the day his six year old 'nephew' followed a scrap of a kitten into oncoming traffic was something Jaime couldn't handle being haunted by for the rest of his life.

Sirens he was usually in control of, the time he'd been temporarily suspended from the police force pending further investigation never fully forgotten, still rang in his ears, his thoughts no longer his own but belonging to the dual natures of grief and guilt. The Lannister name would be back in the news cycle come tomorrow morning, his cousin being forced to learn how her youngest, _their_ youngest, if Jaime could believe in any of her lies anymore, found himself fighting for breath, hidden from the media, while Cersei cowered out of reach, of readily courted paparazzi and family alike, on one of the best beaches in Dorne.

He had never been allowed close enough to really care before, existing on the periphery of their lives, letting himself buy into Cersei's paranoia about people asking too many questions about the children, that now, when they needed him, Jaime was at a loss of what was expected. He wouldn't be the one they wanted when their world became blood and gold, crash and break, despite the months spent under each other's feet to grow used to Myrcella's questionable musical taste and Tommen's kittens. He felt no further forward than he had twenty years earlier, when Cersei had announced her first pregnancy like it was something they had discussed and agreed upon.

Suddenly, a chorus of professionally concerned voices pierced through the descending veil of shock bleakly blanketing the waiting room in half spoken promises and prayers, drawing Jaime's eyes to a flurry of activity that burst through the ambulance bay doors. He knew that, no matter what kind of tragedy had touched another family, every second would count for this new one, another soul to add to the collection of the hospital wings. From his restricted vantage point hunkered at the back of the room, he noticed that the girl they were rushing through on a stretcher looked to be no older than Tommen, her tiny body equally dwarfed by the equipment laden gurney and the silently shaking blonde refusing to let go of a pale hand as fiercely freckled as her own sorrow stricken face.

Assuming that the scene playing out in front of him was an everyday occurrence for the heavily bloodied stage, Jaime wouldn't have given them a second thought, had he not caught the end of a turquoise tinged, teary glance the blonde cast out into the tension, looking for reasons he too had mislaid somewhere along the way. It might have taken no longer than a few seconds for him to realise that worry had, however temporarily, aged her well beyond her years but his first impression seemed to be stuck on how, even on a good day, describing her as 'plain' would have been hiding a relative kindness she didn't deserve.

But, in spite of the world crumbling around him, there was something about her lack of beauty and grace that ignited a spark of recognition inside of Jaime, the surfacing memory of the first day he had seen her, his need for anything familiar causing him to shift forward in his seat.

Her eyes narrowed as he continued to find an inexplicable interest in the untold stories swimming in their astonishing depths, attempting to smother whatever spark was holding them both steady with an uncomfortably knowing smile. And as her regard raked over his clasped hands, bound together in bloody infamy, she froze in recognition and Jaime found that her step back into the horrors of reality, the ones blasted on newspapers and splattered on parking lot pavements, was enough to allow his self-protective facade to begin to drop.

"Uncle Jaime!"

Myrcella's choked cry of acknowledgment sliced through the air, causing more than a few troubled heads to turn to take in the over photographed teenager, who was standing alongside one of the only people Jaime could irrefutably rely on to say the right thing when faced with a crisis. Almost as if addressing another conference room bursting at the seams with salivating journalists or hypercritical potential investors, his brother raised a hand in appeasement, failing to mask the flickering distress straining at his stonily set features. Tyrion quickly read the present situation, and all its possible outcomes, before Jaime could even scramble to his feet.

"Where in the seven hells have you been?" he hissed, opening his arms for Myrcella to step into, offering what little comfort he could dredge up. Looking down as she sniffled and shuffled closer, a little embarrassed but more grateful for the support, Jaime noticed the half full bottle of juice peeking out of her jacket pocket, a crumpled up doughnut wrapper keeping it company. “When I say things like ‘urgent’ and ‘emergency’,” he snapped, lowering his voice so the rest of the anxious waiting room couldn’t overhear. “That doesn’t generally mean that you have time to stop for snacks.”

Cella had barely laid her head on his shoulder before she lifted it, the empathy washing over her features preventing him, yet again, from seeing catching a glimpse of someone who wasn't there. Cersei would never cry in public. _The more people you love_ , Jaime could hear her voice echoing in his head, dismissing him with a piercing look, so unlike the girl he had fallen for.

He'd started to come to terms with the fact that not too long ago he would have done anything to stop her from leaving, instead asking her to run away with him to any place where they wouldn't be a name first and people later. But the words had been repeated and rejected so many times over the years that they had long lost their true meaning. Jaime knew he would always feel something for Cersei, although, as he had finally managed to pull away only to watch her bury herself deeper in work and wine and wrath, he had begun to realise that her love for him had always taken a back seat to a self-propelled need for power.

"It's my fault, Uncle Jaime," Cella told him a little unsteadily, her eyes swimming with tears yet to be shed. "I just wanted to do something to help and giving blood was the first thing that came to mind. We-we may have lied about my age but I swear that was it."

"If this ever gets back to her mother, you know she’s going to smell your influence all over it.” Jaime turned to Tyrion, who was staring brazenly at the doors where the blue-eyed girl had been lingering by earlier, the trademark Lannister smirk turning hard and unforgiving. “She will find a way to make you pay if you've managed to get her only daughter in trouble."

"I think 'trouble' is a relative concept in this case," his brother replied absently, still firmly fixated on watching the shaded figures drop in and out of focus from behind the patterned glass of the waiting room, an army of briskly professional doctors moving between lifesaving procedures. "Especially since we all have such _rare_ blood types.”

Jaime cursed inwardly at the barely veiled insinuation, remembering being bled like a stuck pig each time Cersei had gone into labour because the hospital had been criminally under stocked. Though at the same time, he realised he'd been an idiot for not asking about donating until now. It might not help him shake any of the guilt that was building over not keeping a closer eye on Tommen, but sitting still for the best part of an hour, with only his spiralling thoughts for company, hadn’t done anything either.

“Where…?” he started to ask, keeping a reassuring arm around Myrcella as Tyrion broke eye contact with the secured doors just long enough to cock his head towards the flyer laden far wall.

_Blood Bank_ , Jaime read. _Blue Wing. Basement. Room 7._

*******

Stranded in the disconcertingly deserted first floor staff room with little more than the now familiar sounds of the hospital shifting from day to night to keep her grounded, Brienne Tarth had never felt more alone in her entire life. With her mind currently running a gauntlet of never-ending scenarios, she instinctively repositioned herself in the uncomfortable recliner, bringing her knees up to rest against her chest, subconsciously hoping that the childish reaction would offer her more protection than it ever had in the past.

One of the more sympathetic nurses had passed Brienne a mug of steaming tea before she had been called in to assist with the incoming trauma, _Alysanne_ , offering the same kind of non-committal platitudes they had all been taught, at one time or another, to use when trying to calm fearfully frantic families. Most families, though, weren’t associated with world renowned paediatric surgeons, like Brienne was. And right now, after having left a volley of voicemails ever since her youngest sister had been thrown from her horse, she could have used her father to help steer her mind back onto the path she was more comfortable with.

Inhaling deeply, as if that alone could stop her trembling fingers from reaching out for memorised words and phrases like ‘traumatic brain injury’, ‘subarachnoid haemorrhage’ or, _Alysanne_ , ‘brain death’, Brienne found herself deeply resenting whatever hospital policy had instructed her colleagues to ask her to sit and stay in the purposeless place like an unwanted, disobedient pet. She wouldn’t be the first member of staff who had born witness to a loved one being wheeled through the overtaxed emergency room doors. But where they had been given the benefit of the doubt, allowed to continue triaging and treating the patients flitting in and out of the hospital on that unseasonably warm April night, less than six months later, Brienne hadn’t even been given the opportunity to defend her ability to hold on to a certain level of professional detachment in the face of indescribable tragedy.

Back in med school, which felt like a lifetime ago now that she had become fully immersed in the daily grind of trauma residency, Brienne had been reminded over and over again that her heart was too soft to watch people be welcomed into the arms of the Stranger. If she would just pick another speciality, she was told, then it would save her the pain that came with feeling helpless. Something that would be more suited to her gender than her unfeminine build, Dr Tarly had informed her. Something where her famous name could be allowed to fade into a novelty, rather than questioned at every turn. Something which would give her a chance to hide from the rest of the world. Although, no matter which path Brienne had ultimately chosen, she knew it wouldn’t have prevented her brother from taking an accountancy job in Braavos, which had resulted in his death. It couldn’t have stopped Alysanne from falling, or, two weeks after Brienne had graduated, a tiny, nameless teenage girl from dying in the ambulance bay before anyone could replenish the blood that had ran from her veins like an unseen current calling a steadily flowing river back to the ocean.

Even as she became caught up in reliving her past mistakes, the flickers of adrenalin were still coursing through her tensed muscles, making Brienne nervously twitch in her seat. The urge to run until she couldn’t think, to find comfort in the routine of solving other people’s problems, to be able to focus on something else and forget, for just a moment, at war with the voice of reassuring reason. But, still, finding herself looking in from the other side, as if this whole night had been nothing more than a vivid out-of-body experience, Brienne was having difficulty placing trust in the hands of her judgemental colleagues with their regimented rainbow colours and malicious misogynistic mischief. Her fingers itched to take back control, gripping the logoed mug tight enough for the china to send up a grating whine under the pressure, the whisper of sound thundering around the cavernous space and setting her shredded nerves on edge.

Unable to pacify them, she all but jumped to her feet when the door, weighed down with up-to-date hygiene guidelines and calendars for blood drives and fetes alike, opened all of a sudden, sending waves of protesting tea rising up to smother her hands in scolding splashes. The nurse who entered, a pretty little blonde who had been called in from Harrenhal General for the summer season and never returned, glanced down at Brienne's hands, automatically launching into a rushed apology. She could only make it halfway through before a yawn interrupted her usually pleasant demeanour.

"Gods, Brienne," Pia mumbled as she covered her mouth, taking a handful of steps forward in order to remove the swirling, though contained, storm of liquid from further drenching calloused, freckled skin. "If we'd known you were in here on your own..." she broke off as another yawn threatened, shaking her head as if the exhaustion was more irritating than anything else and allowing her eyes to close briefly. "We would have had you come and sit at the nurse’s station. You stay still for longer than thirty seconds out there today and you'll be given a job to do."

Brienne wrinkled her brow, her piqued interest clearly visible, if the small smile now lighting up the smaller woman’s face was anything to go by. Although, even the prospect of being put to work couldn’t stop Brienne from toying with the hemline of her shirt, her immediate nerves still needing an outlet, as Pia took the silence between them as a signal to continue talking.

“Only if you wanted to, of course. Nobody’s going to blame you if you’d prefer to wait for news about your sister. Val’s in with her now, and it’s perfectly alright to worry but, you know, Dr Wilde isn’t going to take any crap from Hunt and his band of merry men. Alys is in the best possible hands.”

Brienne heaved a sigh of something rounding relief, although, deep in her heart, she knew they wouldn’t have called in the hospital’s best neurosurgeon if there wasn’t a possibility of lasting damage. But she kept that concern to herself, as she did her fear and guilt and exhaustion. “Tell me what I can do to help.”

"How do you feel about taking blood?"


	2. Chapter Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Trapped half way between thinking that he’d been deliberately lying in wait for her and that, somehow, she had kept him suspended in the underground no man’s land, Brienne watched as he languidly rolled his shoulders and stretched, drawing her attention to well-developed muscles which tugged at the seams of his blood splattered pinstriped shirt.
> 
> She certainly didn’t mean to blush as he fixed her with a smile that didn’t quite reach his knowing eyes, the quirk of his lips acting as a reflection to his earlier attempt to knock her off balance, having been caught noticing him in the waiting room, when she should have been fully focused on her sister.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for all the comments and kudos on the first chapter! Even after all the stories I've written, it still means so much to read your comments and ideas about where this story might be going. 
> 
> Thanks also go to the lovely RoseHeart, who is far too modest about how much help she gives me while I'm working through all the tangents that come with writing a multi chapter fic. 
> 
> Apologies again for any mistakes, medical or otherwise. I had a strong idea of this hospital basement and it's probably more like the place I currently work in, that used to be a med school morgue, then any current hospital. Sorry.

Even from the brief tour Brienne had been given during her first day orientation, she was still aware that the blood bank had long been housed in one of the oldest, and coldest, parts of the hospital, an archaically adorned azure wing that was all that remained of the original Storm’s End General. The group of departing residents had delighted in telling them the tale that afternoon years ago, explaining how it had existed for centuries, tightly locked away in an unsuspecting bubble, serving lords and smallfolk alike, before miracle and tragedy forced the structure to change with the times, or risk being left behind to crumble into ruin. Brienne had been a child when the most recent changes had taken place, the name of a mayor, who’d cared more about drinking himself into an early grave than the needs of his constituents, being mounted across doors and hallways in memoriam, while she was not yet old enough to realise that they were stripping away the identities of those who had worked in and walked the wards as much as that of the building itself. Although, even now, as she let her anxieties rush back in and skip down the basement stairs in time to the beat of her noisy heart, Brienne barely glanced at the same turn of the century Targaryen architecture that filled and bowed the bookshelves of her tiny apartment.

Clumsily finishing her descent, she practically stumbled into the arrogantly attractive blond who had blatantly regarded her earlier entrance from the sheltered recesses of the emergency waiting room. He pushed himself up off the painted, peeling wall and stepped forward, without breaking eye contact, into a fluorescent spotlight. Trapped half way between thinking that he’d been deliberately lying in wait for her and that, somehow, she had kept him suspended in the underground no man’s land, Brienne watched as he languidly rolled his shoulders and stretched, drawing her attention to well-developed muscles which tugged at the seams of his blood splattered pinstriped shirt.

She certainly didn’t mean to blush as he fixed her with a smile that didn’t quite reach his knowing eyes, the quirk of his lips acting as a reflection to his earlier attempt to knock her off balance, having been caught noticing him in the waiting room, when she should have been fully focused on her sister. At least the rising warmth now painting her cheeks in a shade of scandalous scarlet danced hand in hand with a clearing of her mind.

And as the fog cleared, Brienne realised she knew this man. How could she possibly forget someone as handsome and assured as him, the complete opposite to what she saw reflected back at her in the mirror every morning? He was the golden demigod who had allowed their battlefield to become a school parking lot, duelling from behind visors of glass, their steeds thrumming with barely restrained impatience, using glares as sharpened weapons. Though they had never exchanged a single word before, the memory of his green gaze had slipped into her mind, unwavering in its intensity while the fought over spots to pick up their daily charges.

“You would think the importance of hospital time management would be taught to even baby nurses on their first day,” he drawled almost casually, breaking her of her angry glare. Despite the absence of anything but snark and charm in his tone, Brienne could sense the waves of tension flying off him like he was struggling as much as she was to stay grounded. She wondered why he had been slouched in that cold plastic chair in the waiting room. “I mean, unless you’re as incompetent as you are ugly.”

Brienne tried to suppress the urge to roll her eyes at his sloppily aimed insult. She had, after all, heard it, and far worse, before. In fact, as a classmate had pointed out at the end of a particularly awful shift, if they weren't being called ugly or stupid or inexperienced once in a while, then they probably weren't doing their jobs correctly. The gilded god in front of her wasn't blindly drunk or visibly in pain, although there was a cut above his left eye that Brienne wanted to take a closer look at, but he was likely inching towards shock and looking to get a rise out of her seemed to be his favoured coping method. _If Margie was here, he'd be saying the same things to her._

She took what little comfort there was in the thought, sighing inwardly and indicating that he should let her past if the key in her pocket was going to marry with the blood bank's old fashioned series of severe locks. "If you could just give me a minute."

"Only if you're sure that's all it's going to take. You haven’t exactly filled me with confidence in your abilities yet," he replied, the act of nonchalance still present, though his voice was dropping lower, gaining a dangerously rough quality that she didn't quite trust, each syllable falling from his smirking mouth to shatter against the cold concrete under their feet. Brienne felt the hairs along the back of her neck prickle as she turned away to fumble with the metal between her fingers, the air crackling and shifting as he overextended his arm in a mockery of chivalry. "Ladies first."

He’d hardly shown such knightly traits each morning they had soundlessly sparred for space, but the warmth he offered to the children that had clambered in and out of his expensive car could not be forgotten. Looking through that window into a world where she would never be comfortable existing, Brienne hadn’t taken long to realise that however they were all related, he likely wasn’t their father.

Listening to the click of the first lock opening, she found a much wanted response resting sweetly on the tip of her tongue. "And for the record, I'm a doctor, not a nurse."

"I don't care if you're the fucking surgeon general, sweetheart, you'd still be a baby one."

"Apparently, your doctors start to look younger once you reach a certain age. Are you sure that's not the problem here?"

“You need to catch up on your reading, _Doc_ ," he snapped back, faster than lightning, giving her just enough space to breathe but not nearly enough to maintain the two second advantage Brienne needed to counter his barbs as quickly as he was throwing them. “I think you’ll find I’m in the prime of my life.”

This was just like one of their weekday fights, except now they had progressed to using words instead of looks, and Brienne was finding that his voice had the ability to send her into a state of flustered confusion as easily as his gaze.

“And I think _you’ll_ find if you actually read something a little more intellectually challenging than Men’s Health, you would realise that forty _isn’t_ the new thirty.” The third and final lock was stubbornly refusing to budge, no matter how many times she tried to wiggle the key. Brienne bit into her already chapped lower lip in an attempt to prevent the initial bubbles of frustration from boiling over. “It’s all downhill…”

“GQ,” he interrupted effortlessly, although Brienne could still feel his gaze darting around sporadically, the intermittently insignificant noises floating down the stairs, making them both jump, warranting as much of his attention as the slope of her shoulders and the non-existent swell of her breasts.

“W-what?”

“I read GQ. And The Economist. And I’m only thirty eight, so I’m pretty certain the things you’re referring to aren’t going downhill just yet. But thank you for your concern about my sex life.”

“I, um…since we’re now s-sharing,” she stuttered, her cheeks beginning to burn hotter than one of the seven hells as she glanced back over her shoulder and noticed he was simply waiting for her to finish the attack, rather than moving to interject again. “Am I-I allowed to ask why you’re covered in blood? Or would I need to sign…a Lannister family waiver before I could be given that information?”

If he was bothered by the half confirmation of his identity, he didn’t show it. “Oh you’ll definitely need to sign something. My father doesn’t believe in the sanctity of doctor-patient confidentiality any more than he trusts the team of lawyers he has on the payroll.”

His sudden bark of laughter rang through the empty space, and, as it echoed back to assist in turning the key that last quarter inch, the tangible taste of bitterness in the air made Brienne hesitate over digging any further down that particular rabbit hole. Unless it was going to affect how quickly his blood clotted or had been the cause of the wound marring and matting his raised brow, it was really none of her business. The Lannister Corporation could have truly raised a brood of reckless, alcoholic, homicidally incestuous children, like her friend’s much loved tabloids wanted the world to believe, but not even the truth of one of those secrets would change the task she had been given to complete. After which, Brienne knew, he would quickly fade from her memory, only to be replaced by another problem to solve and the next beautifully awkward patient. Even if that next person was likely to be her little sister. And even if she may never see him again because she had no more reason to be in that parking lot.

Pushing the door open, and pushing down the spiralling dread, she revealed a state-of-the-art facility hiding behind the solid panel, history graciously stepping aside for the gleam of new technology. Brienne took a chance to send up a prayer, for them all, through concrete and glass, just for a second trusting again in the wisdom of the Crone, the compassion of the Mother and the courage of the Warrior. Although, as she stood suspended in the doorway, ignoring the way his intensely evergreen eyes were now focusing on the scattered patterns of freckles across her cheeks, she couldn’t clearly remember a time before she’d found more conviction in science than faith. Her late mother had been the believer, not her apologetically absentee father or sweetly superficial stepmother, and it had been close to twenty years since Brienne had last fallen asleep with those tales running around her head.

“Shouldn’t I get _something_ in return?” Jaime muttered, finding a way to push through her thoughts.

“In return for what?” she volleyed back without thinking, the engrained entitlement in his voice snapping Brienne back to where she needed to be, six words becoming a physical being that buried under her skin to strike at her unspoken promises to remain professional. There was no concealing the flicker of sincerity that accompanied his surfacing shit eating grin, waiting, hopefully in vain, for the flaw to shatter through the rest of her armoured composure. “If you’d like to take a seat, Mr. Lannister,” she continued, honest and honeyed in the same breath, pointedly ignoring his comment. “We can get started.”

“They obviously didn’t teach you about listening to patients either,” he retorted, instinctively holding the door open while his attention switched from surveying her skin to inspecting the room. “What kind of medical school did you go to, anyway? The Qyburn Institute for the Deaf, Blind, and Criminally Insane?”

_Breathe._ "You’re not my patient yet. But, from what I can tell without taking a full history, you might be suffering from too much adrenaline in your blood, possibly after witnessing or being involved in a traumatic event. It’s the abundance of this hormone that brings about the fight or flight response in most people. Right now, you’re exhibiting signs of the former.” Brienne still couldn’t be sure if it was his antagonistic attitude or simply his continued presence that was making her act like she had been given the worst prepared med student ever, having to clench her fists as she watched him pace aimlessly around the room like an unexpectedly caged animal, each vicious circle feeding into the building tension in her own muscles. _Breathe_. “And, not that you actually care, but I graduated second in m-my class from St Baelor’s. My paperwork’s at home because trauma doctors’ d-don’t usually have time to whip their certification out every time someone needs our help. Now. Sit. Down.”

“Your childhood must have been awful for you,” he commented as if he’d only been half listening to her informative outburst, eventually lowering his toned ass into the soft, waiting, leather to glance up at her through a fan of pale eyelashes. He blinked, the false flirtation she’d expected to find in the glinting emerald torrents notable in its absence, a solitary moment of genuine heartbreak staring back instead. Brienne cleared her throat, held in his gaze as she felt herself beginning to drown in the sorrowful swirling, searching for the right words of reassurance that would close the distance between them. The unknown common ground existing between her and Alysanne, between him and whoever had brought him crashing through her door, shifting beneath her feet.

“I’m…”

“Were you a foot taller than all the boys?” he continued, the moment gone almost as quickly as it had arisen. Brienne glared as he left her to stumble over a sentiment that was no longer welcome. “They laughed at you, called you names? And since you’re bossy enough to be an only child, no wonder you never learned how to share. And now, for the record,” he smiled predatorily, leaning back and resting his feet on the sterilised bench, claiming the space so that she would either have to go around or through him to get to the secured fridges. “It goes a little something like, ‘I show you mine, you show me yours’.”

“I hardly think knowing your age and reading material counts as showing me anything,” Brienne grumbled as she strode across the room, choosing to ignore his dig about being an only child even as her heart cried out in stifled pain. On reaching his ridiculously smug face, she made a point of sliding an arm under his knees to force him into a more appropriately upright position. Although, almost as soon as she’d let go of his weight and turned to start opening drawers in search of needles and tourniquets and donation bags, something softly brushed over the small of her back and her eyes rolled unconsciously. She tried to ignore the touch, using words dripping with sarcasm and malice to hide behind as well as he did. “I could probably find out more about you from a Google search. Would ‘tall, cocky, gorgeous and he knows it, Lannister’ get me many results?”

“Jaime.” He smiled triumphantly, biting his lip and shifting as he looked down her body.

“Jaime?” Brienne repeated, so caught up in wondering how his name could sound vaguely familiar that the realisation of what she had just confessed arrived too late, brazenly spreading up her neck like a slowly dawning sunrise. The recently located donation questionnaires slid through her grasping fingers before she could stop them from falling, as if the rising temperature of her returning embarrassment had melted them all into pitiful puddles of shamefully improper conduct.

“If you think I’m hot, you might as well have a name to cry out when you’re remembering me later. Plus, if this experience is going to be worth a damn, you can’t just put ‘jackass’ on one of those forms.”

“Some schools of thought believe that an over reliance on sexually charged behaviour or innuendo, in an acutely stressful situation, can be seen as a way of depersonalising issues that are too raw and painful to be processed properly.” She felt him staring, so rushed to an explanation, even though he didn’t need or deserve such a thing. “I did a couple of psych rotations last year. A-anyway, lucky for us both, it s-seems J. Lannister would…work either way. For the f-form.” The words were barely out of her mouth before Brienne braced herself for his inevitable insult, feeling forced to frown at the scattered mess of papers lying in front of her as a heavy silence met the half-hearted joke.

_Was that it? Did I just win? Will he shut up now?_

She shifted her weight surreptitiously as the pause stagnated, not wanting to give Jaime the satisfaction of knowing he made her beyond uncomfortable, the prickle of charge holding them together slowly expanding like the enclosed space wouldn’t be able to contain all their hopes and fears for much longer.

“In case your sheltered upbringing has made you too socially awkward to notice,” Jaime eventually rasped, as if his façade was faltering with the same kind of thoughts she didn’t want to linger on. “That would have been a good time for you to _share_. In politer circles than you’d be welcome I…”

“Oh for seven’s sake!” she snapped, too late to stop a wave from washing over her as the floodgates she’d been trying to hold back opened deep inside. A part of her knew that even without a name, Jaime would have no trouble describing her to any of the attendings if she did or said anything that crossed significant lines, but Brienne was rapidly losing the fight with rationality. It was a fight that had started the minute Alysanne had stopped moving and was ending with the ridiculously understanding light gleaming in Jaime Lannister’s eyes. And the thought that he knew just what she was suffering through was infuriating. “You think because I work here and look like this that I don’t know about _polite_ circles?! Or because I don’t particularly want to share personal details about my shit day that I’m cold and lonely?! My little sister, who’s never hurt anyone or anything in all of her seven and a half years, is dying upstairs for all I know and you want me to stand here and entertain you with tales of Tarth family parties?”

Jaime shot to his feet as soon as she finished talking, his slow, steady steps around the tiny table contradicting each sharply drawn breath that she was beginning to subconsciously copy, watching the quiver of his Adam’s apple as he swallowed, the flare of his nostrils. “My cousin's kid got knocked down by a car not two hours ago. I’m covered in his blood and you think I’m here because I need someone to _entertain_ me?” Brienne recalled the sweet little boy with golden hair that would light up when he saw the car that constantly tried to steal her parking spot and would leap to take the hand of the man that stepped out of it. “Fucking hells, sweetheart, you’ve got a high opinion of yourself. But I suppose I shouldn’t have expected anything less from Selwyn Tarth’s daughter.”

So they both knew each other's stories

“Brienne.”

Jaime didn’t miss a beat, sliding forwards as she took a wary glance out of the corner of her eye to realise that, either by luck or good judgment, he didn’t appear to want to pin her to the wall in frustration. Brienne’s breath escaped in a rush, though her heart still felt like it was racing towards the speed of light, furious and frightened and beyond relieved she wasn’t going to have punch him out like she had Dr. Hunt in the on-call room at Christmas. “So, has all of this made your daddy proud yet, _Brienne_?” he purred, each step falling into a perfect give and take as if they had been rehearsing this meeting for weeks. “Trying to follow in his footsteps like a good lit…giant beast of a woman?”

“What does it take to get you to shut up?” she spat back. "I don’t know why you can keep joking when there are children…I c-can’t, I’ve tried and I can’t. What if she doesn’t…? What if he doesn’t…?”

“No.”

“Excuse me?”

“You heard me,” Jaime growled as he advanced ever closer, paying no attention to her burgeoning scowl as he kept radiating authority, half remembered news stories and celebrity gossip snippets slowly knitting together in Brienne’s head to almost make sense. He was military, maybe law enforcement or secret service, but, as far as she could recall, missing evidence or excessive force, or something important enough to call for lawyers and press statements and TV appearances, meant he had lost the respect of his colleagues back when she was in high school. Whatever Jaime was though, it was enough of a beautiful mystery to keep her eyes running along his jawline, gnawing at the inside of her cheek and staring back into smouldering emerald embers. He licked his lips before he spoke again and a primal part of Brienne, that wasn’t still contemplating the same fight or flight response she had been trying to inform him about, traitorously shivered. “You shouldn’t say things like that.”

“I was just…”

“I know,” Jaime sighed, running a hand through his hair as he ducked his head like he was considering calling time on their heated back and forth. “Me too.”

“I’m sorry. I’m supposed to be helping and all I’m doing is making things worse. If you want me to call someone else to…”

“I think I trust you not to hurt me.”

“Has anyone ever told you you’ve got a real problem with interrupting? Generally, in _polite_ circles, you let someone finish talking before you offer your own opinion.”

“Touché, Doc,” he winked, though the gesture held less weight than Brienne expected it would have done only ten minutes earlier. Falling to his knees, despite her protestations that she didn’t need his assistance, Jaime scooped up the questionnaires, leaving all but one on top of the folder where she had pulled them from. “Since we’re going to be stuck together for at least the next half hour, what do you say we get to know each other a little better?”

“That’s not the… We should be…”

“Question 1. Are you feeling healthy and well today? Well, you’ve been looking closely enough to know that I’m fine physically, so I think we can skip that one.”

“Mr Lannis…Jaime.”

“You said you wanted to help. And I’ve got nothing to hide from _this_. Unless you don’t want to hear about all the tattoos I got on my travels. Just…humour me, Brienne,” Jaime found her eyes again as he curled his tongue around her name, his slow, melancholy, smile as genuine as the one pulling at her own lips, her mind filling with the possibilities that this could help mould the stories she had been creating about an unnamed, beautiful man staring her down from behind his wheel, into something closer to the truth. “Question 2….”


	3. Chapter Three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thirty odd questions later, including a few she was sure Jaime just threw in to check she was still listening, Brienne had learned that he didn’t really have any tattoos, though she could have discovered that particular fact after insisting he change into a disposable scrub top, chastely turning her back while Jaime stripped, all the while daring her to look.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, I think I've now settled on Thursday as my posting day so I should be posting once a week now almost up until season six starts.
> 
> Thank you again to everyone who has read, commented or left kudos, l be replying to all your lovely comments soon, and all my love and appreciation goes out to RoseHeart for helping keep this chapter on track!
> 
> I hope you enjoy!

Thirty odd questions later, including a few she was sure Jaime just threw in to check she was still listening, Brienne had learned that he didn’t really have any tattoos, though she could have discovered that particular fact after insisting he change into a disposable scrub top, chastely turning her back while Jaime stripped, all the while daring her to look. She'd also found out that he had given blood several times before and preferred to spend his vacations in The Summer Isles, although he had been to both Lys and Braavos in the past year. She had pulled a face at that, wondering if his holiday habits, added to the cut on his forehead, would be enough to send him back upstairs with nothing more than a stale cookie for his troubles. In return, he had simply pouted like a spoilt child, an entire conversation being played out, pointed look by pointed look, silent seconds ticking by to allow him to become the first man Brienne had ever come across who made her find a link between kissing and killing. Jaime yielded milliseconds before she did, explaining it all away with anecdotes about his brother and some of the world’s most beautiful women.

“They’re nice girls, most of them just get a little pissed when he orders off the menu and then can’t pay in the morning.”

_Why does it keep coming back to sex?_ "You mean to say you go all that way to bail him out of brothels?”

“No one else will. And, before you ask, I don’t share my brother’s love of prostitutes. I like _my_ women to want me for more than the gold in my pockets.”

Brienne didn’t know why she suddenly felt the urge to let him in, but after Jaime smiled, changing the subject and telling her of the children; Myrcella and Tommen, four cats, one dog, and several caged reptiles he’d been given to look after by his honeymooning cousin, she'd blurted out that she hadn’t left the Stormlands since her senior year of high school. Although, she had been thinking about planning a trip to Vaes Dothrak once her residency was complete and taking a week off was no longer a luxury. For her sisters.

“You have more than one?” Jaime asked, reminding her that Alys was always picked up first and dropped off last, her other sister having been allowed to choose to go to school across town because it had a better music programme. Wincing as her intermittently trembling fingers caused the sterilised needle to hit solid muscle for a second time, instead of the throbbing vein she had neatly encouraged to surface while he was still complaining about responsibility, Jaime looked up at her, both amused and curious. “You know if you haven’t done this before, I’m not going to be mad. We can stop any time you want.”

Brienne safely disposed of the broken point, calmly bringing her hands into fists and willing them to stop shaking, the merest mention of her sisters cutting into composure she was still trying to claw back. _Breathe, Brienne._ “Oh, I’m more than capable of taking care of you, Lannister. Just shut up and sit still.”

“I think you’re supposed to say ‘lie back and think of Braavos’.”

She let him watch the roll of her eyes. “The more time I spend with you, the more I pity your poor girlfriend.”

“You wouldn’t if you saw the size of my…owww. Were you out sick the day they taught you newbies about bedside manner? That really hurt."

“You’re such a child.”

“Again, you wouldn’t be saying that if you saw…”

Blushing furiously all over again, she swiftly diverted their strange conversation back to family before Jaime could finish that particular sentence. “I have two sisters. Half-sisters, really, but my dad made sure we don’t stress the difference. He’s…” _Not coming_ , she realised, _this is my fault and I have to fix it as best I can_. The thought forced her to blink back acute abandonment, and the terrified tears that were starting to prickle, away.

Jaime didn’t utter a single contrary word as she averted her eyes from the shining green spotlight, his skin remaining warm enough beneath her resting fingers for Brienne to wonder if confiding in a stranger would be easier than talking to her only true friend.

“Arianne’s ten and Alys…Alysanne’s seven and a half. I don’t get to see them as much as I’d like anymore. So, whenever I get time between working and sleeping, I like to pick them up from school and take them to the pool or the movies or…. Sometimes…sometimes, I think they’ll forget about me.”

Jaime snorted. “That’s not likely. Have you looked in the mirror recently?”

“Please don’t.” The usually unflattering surgical scrub top was doing nothing to negate how damn beautiful he was close up. “I’m trying-"

“I’m not a cat person.”

“You’re not a… _what_?”

“Cat person. Neither me or Honor, my dog, likes having them in the house, but Tommen loves them so, we’re both learning to tolerate the little shits.”

The memory of a late autumn afternoon rose to the forefront of her mind, recalling the way the setting sun had glinted off two near identical halos of blond, the overexcitement of the little boy making her think about smiling even now, the pair strolling across the playground with a kitten shaped backpack dangling haphazardly from Jaime’s wrist. But her smile quickly flitted away before it could come to fruition. Brienne didn’t quite know where his story was heading, but the ending was inevitable, if his earlier outburst and the blood splatters were anything to go by. She nodded, guessing that he didn’t really need her validation to continue, understanding through the way his pulse sped and slowed under where her fingers were still placed, that Jaime was trying too.

“Annie’s away with the school this week, skiing beyond The Wall, and my stepmom’s been so busy that I volunteered to take Alys up to the stables to exercise her pony this morning.”

“The cats aren’t supposed to go outside, but when I took Honor for her walk, one must have got out.”

They had yet to react to each other, now that their thoughts had spun back to take a turn for the worse, the circling storm a selfish beast at heart, too focused on talking through the tragic accidents that had brought them into the other’s orbit to question the chains of events reconnecting.

“She does it every day, morning and night, so it’s not as if it was unusual for her to be there.”

“Never work with children or animals,” Jaime muttered, the low timbre of his voice moving to fill the empty spaces between despair and disclosure. The half-full blood bag was Brienne’s only indication that any time at all has passed since her last admission of guilt, having unintentionally slid her fingers further into his palm just as Jaime reached out to squeeze, rotate, and release.

“The kids usually live on a gated estate with my cousin,” he stated, continuing to carefully ghost his fingertips over her skin, producing tickling sensations that straddled the line of uncomfortable and pleasant to scare her returning tears into departing unshed. “Apparently penthouse apartments and main roads are more of a novelty than is good for them.”

“My dad bought one of those places just before I left for college,” she replied absently, watching scarlet liquid run out of his vein, drop by drop, loathe to look directly at him while their hands were near joined. “Azure Crescent?”

“Lyons Road. Casterly House. If you know the area, you’ll…”

“Is that the one that sometimes had the matched pair of vintage red Gryffins in the drive?” Jaime flinched, though the momentary gripping graze of his nails was quickly replaced by a calculating coolness. “They’re nice cars,” Brienne offered in a whisper. She thought all of the cars on the estate were, though his choices for the school run were generally just as expensive but much more sensible. “Not as nice as a Sphinx, but there’s not…sorry.”

“You’re a car geek? I’ll have to take you for a ride sometime.” She knew he couldn’t mean to follow through, but still Brienne pressed her lips together to stop herself from reacting at the single ray of sunlight penetrating the darkness. “They were a twenty-first birthday present from my aunt. One was totalled a couple of months after Cersei's eldest learned to drive so, there hasn’t been a _matched pair_ for a long time in that house. I think the one he got his latest stepfather to replace it is gold.”

“Annie and Alys are probably going to end up just as spoilt as your cousin's kid if my stepmom has her way.”

“It takes a lot more than a few ponies and ski trips to do any lasting damage, Doc.”

“Even if it’s a miniature Dornish sand steed? I wouldn’t be surprised if it costs at least twice my yearly rent just to keep.” Brienne closed her eyes to take a deep breath, seeing the fall, the lights, the worry, but feeling Jaime holding himself, and her, steady. “They have a bit of a reputation-”

“Don’t we all?”

“No. _They_ have a bit of a reputation for being hard to handle, especially for children, but we seemed to have found one that’s was placid as an Arbor pony. So when we a-arrived, Alys went down to the stall and I went to pay for h-her lesson with this expert Dothraki instructor that’s visiting and…and I-I don’t…I don’t know what happened. We were talking, I’m not sure for how long, and then I heard….” Brienne was so lost in the story that she didn’t even have enough professionalism left to tell Jaime off for going against donation rules by squeezing her hand so tight she thought she would bruise. “A-a…thud that made me feel sick to my stomach.”

Jaime growled out a noise from the back of his throat that Brienne assumed was something close to supportive encouragement, though his attention was no longer solely focused on her. Completing another visual sweep of the room, as if something profound had changed in the last few minutes, he glanced over her shoulder at two small stacks of stored blood neatly marked ‘T. Lannister’ and ‘M. Baratheon’, his hold of her hand not loosening. She knew that they were just passing ships looking for lifelines in the dark, throwing out threads that were temporarily tying them together, Jaime rotating his wrist as she considered the power of bonds and kindred spirits, gently entwining their fingers before she could stop him, like they could be more than adversarial acquaintances.

“You shouldn’t…” she began, finding her tongue again as the bag swelled past three quarters full. Brienne tore her eyes away from the dangerously angelic golden sheen catching the glare of the throbbing fluorescent strip light, to look up at the unfaltering clock face, six minutes having flown by since her third attempt struck a lucky third vein. “You’re not supposed to…”

“Once you hear that sound, you don’t easily forget it.” Experience dripped off each whispered word like bitterly burnt molasses, the sentiment too significant to have come from just one incident. “Even the Academy likes to keep that part under wraps, until you’ve been a witness or the cause…how are you so warm?” Jaime paused. “You learn to go away inside.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Why?” he spat back, her whispered apology hitting a nerve better than a needle. “Do you have multiple warrants out for your arrest? Was it you who pulled that trigger months ago, instead of me? Do you enjoy running over little children in the couple of _seconds_ you have to spare in your busy, busy life?”

She wrenched her hand away from his, taking a step back as the venom found gaps in the walls he was pushing against. Removing the tube from his arm a little more forcefully than she intended to, she tilted her head to regard his ire, firmly pressing a cotton pad to the glaring wound in order to stem any further bleeding. “We’re done here, Mr Lannister. You can see yourself out, I-I’ll make sure this gets to where it’s needed.”

“Doc…”

“Your family will be happy to have you back safe and sound after the day you’ve all had.” _Go and test somebody else’s patience._ “Just…just be sure to get one of the doctor’s upstairs, or your primary care physician, as soon as possible to have a look at your eye.”

“Brienne….”

“The door’s that way, Jaime.”

“Brienne, that’s not what I meant.” She heard him let go of a heavy exhale, his tone gentling as if the stored air had been hiding an army of reckless, ruthless knights, all braying for blood to replace that which he had voluntarily given away. “You just need to accept that everything will go a lot easier for you if you stop taking the blame for things that aren’t your fault.”

“Only…” _I’m sorry, Alys, I’m so sorry. I should have… if I could have… I would have…_ “Only if you do the same.” She attempted a wry smile despite her stomach churning. She hid how quickly it fell by scrawling Jaime’s name along the plastic covering of his donation and turning away to store it in the fridge on top of his brother’s. The packages couldn’t have been in there longer than an hour, but one of her colleagues had already gone to the trouble of conscientiously adding blood types alongside their names. Something significant, but buried, clicked in Brienne’s head to make her take a second glance at what she assumed was Myrcella’s donation, the neat symbols an uneasy beacon cutting through the descending darkness in her mind to reach perfunctory passages of textbooks buried in her long term memory. “No matter what your father thinks, Jaime, I will always honour doctor-patient confidentiality. Whatever you want to share with me goes no further than these four walls.”

“That’s good because I’d say you already know more about me than most of the people I’m in regular contact with. Who else would care that I haven’t had sex for over a year or a tetanus inoculation since I was a teenager?”

“I’m sure you can find somebody who would be interested to talk about the former, if not the latter,” she muttered darkly, busying herself with tiding up, checking and double checking the weight of the keys and phone in her pockets as she moved around him in the silence. “Are you ever going to go?”

“Soon,” Jaime promised. “Right after you deal with whatever malady is causing you to keep staring above my eyes. I know I’m probably the most attractive man you’ve ever had at your mercy, but, trust me, my forehead is not one of my best assets.” He didn’t wait for her to either confirm or deny his suspicions before charging forward once again, dropping his gaze to the floor like the white on blue patterned lino had suddenly become the most interesting thing in the room. “They’ve been doing some work in my building recently, not enough to mean we have to be relocated, but enough to be a nuisance, and the fire escape door has been left propped open while they paint. Kittens can’t use elevators as far as I’m aware so, it had to have taken the stairs all the way down to street level.”

“And Tommen f-followed?”

Jaime nodded, his eyes remaining lowered. “I think he’d take the whole menagerie to school with him if he could.” He brightened visibly but Brienne was slowly beginning to understand the nuances of his moods, forced and factual, both of them in the habit of wanting to put a little distance between themselves and the painful realities they came across on a daily basis, though Jaime was almost over reliant on skills she would never have to hand; beauty and a sharp tongue chief amongst them. “So, Doc,” he grimaced good-naturedly as he raised a hand to the torn skin above his brow. “What’s the damage? Am I going to be hideously scarred and unlovable for the rest of my natural born days?”

A voice that sounded distinctly like her old, cruel and jaded Septa warned Brienne that another step and this would all become too close, too intimate, too immoral but she quickly brushed strands of gold off Jaime’s forehead anyway, hoping that the intensifying hammering in her chest hadn’t broken into an audible range. “That depends on if you can find anyone who can put up with your attitude for long enough to find you endearing, rather than annoying, and I don’t think so.” She brought her other hand up to settle under his chin, carefully turning Jaime’s head into the light and unsuccessfully trying to ignore the rippling shudder that passed over her palm, her gentle touch being impulsively misread as tenderness. “You’ll need a couple of butterfly stitches to keep the wound closed but it should all heal up on its own. Do I…want to know how you…?”

“Headlight. After…I think.” He shrugged, the gesture far more graceful than it should have been, immediately wincing as Brienne sneakily swiped the scratch, and most of his upper eyelid, with the same antiseptic solution she’d used on his arm.

"Don’t move your head and it won’t hurt.”

“Don’t ask me questions then.”

“A simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’ would suffice. You don’t need to fidget every time you want to say something.”

“ _Yes_ , I do.” He shuffled forward in his seat, pulling himself up straight and arching his neck in order to get a better look at her, the submissive behaviour contradicting the series of mumbling murmurs that were being produced from her fingers having to dig deeper into his flesh to prevent any further movement. "It's a shame that your face is such a hideous mess because your eyes are truly incredible."

"You don't have to pretend to be nice either." Brienne pushed the unforeseen compliment, buried under an insult, away as she felt his fingertips brush against the back of her knee, the thin material of her trousers offering little protection against his fevered touch. Knowing he was burning out, but unable to do anything about it, she could only croon wordless sounds in reply, soothing him like a small child after a nightmare, the peaking pain in the pit of her stomach whispering of how easy it would be to draw him closer. "It's ok."

"No, it's not." His hand slid up to cup the back of her thigh and she took an unsteady half step towards him, checking the stitches she'd just lain, cursing the involuntary twitch that had her rearranging silky locks back to their original positions. Closing her eyes to imagine a bolder, smaller, prettier version of herself asking him to stop and keep going, Jaime squeezed and her exhale became an expletive, the shock of it all causing her hand to skip over his cheek, eyelashes fluttering at the feel of her thumb running down his throat, decelerating to a full stop only to come to rest on taut muscles. He hummed like a contended cat and, instead of embracing the appropriate levels of sensibility, Brienne allowed the deliberate roll of his shoulder to bring her closer to grazing the exposed warm, tanned skin along his collarbone.

“We’re done here, Mr Lannister,” she whispered, repeating her earlier attempt to send him back into the arms of an anxiously waiting family, willing herself to be the first to move. But it would be easier said than done to pull away from the gravity keeping them orbiting around each other.

“I don’t think we are. We started a long time ago, sweetheart. And I’m aching to finish. Properly.”

His name was almost an afterthought on her lips, a taste of something stolen, something forbidden, threatening to overwhelm her senses right when she needed them the most. And, in that moment, she knew it was wrong for it to feel like it could belong there. The arm that had been resting on the table, irritatingly intruding into her space as she worked, casually wrapped around her undefined waist, neither encouraging nor preventing any further movement, simply holding her in a way that made her skin start to sing. Her heart was skipping beats, forgetting how long it had been since she had been touched like this, wanting things that were being kept out of reach for a reason, if only for a few seconds where Brienne didn’t need to think about anything that was going on above her head.

_Girl versus horse._

_Boy versus car._

_Brienne versus Jaime._

The palm now pressed along her spine gave Jaime just enough leverage to be able to rise to his feet, his abandoned chair skittering across the room to kiss the far wall, no more than inches separating their hips and chests and shoulders, as if he wanted her to be the one to close the gap as much as he wanted to touch. _You want to forget. So does he. He doesn’t really want you._ "I don’t think we’ve even begun,” he purred into her ear. The seductive sound was accompanied by a bark of laughter as she took a giant leap and tensed, realising too late that it was his burgeoning arousal pressing against her thigh. “Do you want to close the door?”

_Yes._ “I need…”

His hand slipped across her shoulder blade and she gripped tightly to his arm, eliciting a sigh that started in her chest and ended in his mouth. _He doesn’t want you, Brienne._ “You need those mile long legs, which have been tempting me for months, wrapped around me?”

_Please_. “I need to get…you…discharged.”

“Why?” She could feel his smile branding her skin, the subsequent scrape of stubble advancing up her neck, causing her knees to begin to buckle, the look in his eyes promising that he was strong enough to keep her standing. “You never admitted me in the first place.”


	4. Chapter Four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The first touch of his lips made her stop dead in her tracks, her thought patterns being replaced by the urge to run her trembling fingers through his hair while Jaime nipped behind her ear, keeping up a filthy commentary of everything he wanted to do in between suckling, open mouth kisses up and down the arch of her neck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you again to everyone who's reading, leaving kudos and comments. I'm not sure if this chapter quite earns the explicit rating, but we are getting closer towards the smuttier side of things. 
> 
> And thanks, as always, to RoseHeart for providing a constant source of support and friendship. And for helping to fix things when I go off on random tangents! :)

The first touch of his lips made her stop dead in her tracks, her thought patterns being replaced by the urge to run her trembling fingers through his hair while Jaime nipped behind her ear, keeping up a filthy commentary of everything he wanted to do in between suckling, open mouth kisses up and down the arch of her neck. _He wants to forget too._ Wondering if her constant exhaustion had caused her to fall asleep in the staff room upstairs, and this encounter was nothing more than a figment of her over active imagination, Brienne threw back her head a little more and listened to Jaime groan in pure frustration, having inadvertently knocked her hips against his in the rush for more. In her current state of mind, she just couldn't fathom how she had ended up pressed against the leonine creature that had for weeks been pushing along and sneaking past, every one of her defences and had nestled into her deepest desires.

“Steady on there, Doc,” he growled, closing his mouth around the place where her heart was pounding for release, sucking just past the point of pleasure, marking her, claiming her. Her every breath was becoming a moan or a whimper, reigniting the bloom in her cheeks as a hand pressed against the jut of her hip to stop the rocking movement. “Before you make me come in my jeans, you should stop and let me take the time to _enjoy_ you.”

_What in the name of the seven am I doing?_ “Oh.”

“Gods, if you’re speechless now, I can’t wait to see what you’re going to be like later.”

Somewhere in the back of her mind, Brienne knew that the rising need to devour each other was masking the same coping mechanism that they'd both stumbled upon, the day’s events too dark and full of terrors to linger on, needing to reaffirm their own existences while others hung in the balance. They were just two souls who had crossed paths before and were starving for any familiar face and consuming emotion. Though, there was a twinge of guilt hidden in there too, as his mouth finally met hers and she was pulled further under Jaime's spell, the fear that she could be taking advantage of his pain disappearing with the sheer effort of trying to keep up with him and his breathless kisses. This wouldn't be the first time she had dreamed of Jaime Lannister, though it was the first in which she knew his name.

Again and again he advanced until Brienne found herself faltering, the fingers she had tangled in his golden curls tightening, tugging until he was looking up at her through a haze of lust, barely grazing her bruised lips while their ragged breathing filled the thickening air. "Brienne," he mumbled, kissing the corner of her mouth almost tenderly. _Like a lover_. Like she was wanted. Like this wasn't just a mad scramble to forget and feel something joyous. "Get on the bench."

"Jaime," she breathed back, enjoying how his name tasted better than the best candy bar she'd ever had, sweet and satisfying and completely contraband. "Don't tell me what to do."

Laughing, he kissed her again, his tongue darting out to lick across her bottom lip, eagerly deepening the touches as she moved and moaned and met the challenge. "How about I tell you what I'd like to _do_ to you instead?"

_He doesn't want you. He doesn't._ "Hmmmmm?"

The colours blooming under her jaw were starting to sting, a reminder of a tomorrow she was trying not to consider, his hands too busy slipping under the regulation dark blue scrub top, under her sweat soaked thin grey shirt, under her skin, to allow her to keep wandering down that path. "Or I could just show you."

“Jaime." _Oh, gods, yes._ Her head wouldn't stop spinning and she pressed closer the second he did the same, forgetting to fight as Jaime guided her towards the door, a whirlwind of lips and hips and hands, getting in a good grope of her ass before she was being picked up and carried across the room. The look of triumph gracing his beautiful face was palpable as shock and instinct mixed and muddled what little sense she had left. Jaime's response to her legs climbing up his sides must have been loud enough to be heard on the other side of the building. Brienne wanted to laugh, to cry, to right every wrong she could, muffling the inescapable emotions rushing back in by stroking her tongue along his while Jaime looked up at her like he couldn't believe his luck, the green in his eyes darkening into something unreadable.

"This might have been a bad idea," he started and her heart felt like it was trying to simultaneously drop to the floor and rise to her throat. _Is he regretting this already?_ "You have amazing legs that I should have let you use." The words were broken up by messy, over eager kisses, the new awkward angle allowing Brienne to press her lips against his forehead while he settled for suckling on her collarbone until she was unceremoniously deposited on top of a work bench. "Because I need you out of those clothes. Now."

"Would you just..." She didn't see where her shirts landed, the blue and the grey disappearing in a flash of colour like the sky changing before an oncoming downpour, dropping her arms to hesitantly tug at Jaime's matching scrubs a heartbeat later. There were other things she wanted, words she wasn’t bold enough to say out loud, or even admit to, when she wasn’t feeling drunk on him. But, if Jaime’s ever increasing smile was anything to go by, he knew every one of the secrets that lurked beneath a surface that was rapidly losing sight of an earlier, calmer shoreline. "Kiss me?”

"With pleasure." He took her lips again before she had a chance to reply, his hands running the length of her torso to caress and trace around the freckles decorating her ribcage, like she was the unlikely canvas for an impressionist painting and Jaime needed to examine the artwork before it faded beyond recognition. The muffled noises he was pulling out of her sounded foreign to her ears as they steadily rose in volume, passion granting her just enough bravery to make sure his shirt became another casualty of war in a starving struggle that only seemed to be escalating the more skin they uncovered. They were just as desperate as the other to touch and taste each sun kissed and snowy sprinkled inch as soon as they were uncovered.

It was a strange and unique sensation to feel her own name echoing excitedly in her head, Jaime drawing soft spirals along her cheekbone as he carelessly snapped the rubber band holding her hair in place, waves of brittle straw cascading over her shoulders to the rumble of a shared murmur. Drawstring knots and zippers hurriedly followed, fumbling with layers of material until she was locking her knees around his hard, naked form.

“How come you’re still wearing too many clothes?” he laughed, grinding into her thigh as he reached around to unhook her bra. Brienne practically jumped right out of the moment at the soft slam of a door above them, shaking away reminders that would untie their shared bonds of unhappiness. “If you weren’t so....gods…”

“If I wasn’t such a god, you’d what?”

Exasperated by his smirking interruption and the arousal simmering in her blood, but not yet being brought up to a boil, she tried to shake her head again, stuttering to pick up the snapping rhythm that was pushing his pelvis forward. The lack of momentum, nevertheless, made Jaime groan into her neck, the warm exhale sending scattered shivers dancing over the exposed surface. As her mind reeled at what her ugly, unfeminine body was doing to him, Jaime left her mouth alone long enough to nibble at her earlobe, dragging his nose along her jaw like he needed to keep breathing Brienne in to centre himself. “Would you lie back and let me bury my head between your magnificent Amazonian thighs?”

_I want you. I want to forget. I want you inside me._ “Jaime,” she hummed against the tensing muscles of his shoulder, flicking her tongue out to taste the first beads of sweat beginning to glisten there, his racing heartbeat keeping time with hers, the sheer longing sparking between them both thrilling and terrifying in its effortlessness. Her hands were no longer under her conscious control, desperate to discover any and all of the sensitivities that had him moaning her name. Brienne tilted her hips to allow herself to move even closer, giving up on undoing the grasping fastenings that were keeping practical scraps of material stuck to her torso. “You don’t need to do that.”

“But I want to.” _I want to. I want you._ “I want a taste.”

The second slam sounded closer, the old building never getting a chance to settle with noises often carrying from the fifth or sixth floor right down to the lobby. But before she had time to properly react, Jaime was pouting and her unsteady focus was hauled back to catch his trembling bottom lip between hers. Fingers slid up her thigh, stopping and starting, stroking and teasing, firmly swiping over the damp proof of her desire. Brienne swallowed her sigh. “Please.”

She thought his smile could have lit up the whole city but Jaime had barely fallen to his knees, holding her closing eyes as he nuzzled into her lack of cleavage, when the unlocked door flew open and the sound of almost contained laughter pierced their intimacy.

“Jaime! Are you really going to do it with the nurse in the room they draw _blood_ in?”

He jumped to his feet before she had a chance to respond, too startled and embarrassed to move any one of her frozen limbs, though Jaime had already successfully covered most of her exposed skin with his own as the intruder stared up at them, yelling over his shoulder. “Brienne is a doctor.”

“Nice.” The little man chuckled cheerlessly, his green eyes and dirty blond hair providing a clear introduction to his lineage. His lack of mirth seemed to be directed more at the awful absurdity of the situation, rather than Jaime’s chivalrous attempts to shield her exposed, ungainly body from view. “Gods know how much you needed to…”

She watched as Jaime set his jaw, indicating that their interrupter should turn around and give them a little privacy. The tension that had all but disappeared in their safe space fell back down from the heavens like a roll of thunder, a look passing between the siblings speaking of things they didn’t want to discuss in front of her. Although her focus had switched to studying the pure white wall, instinctively hugging her arms around her unprotected cooling chest and torso, Brienne felt unfamiliar eyes washing over her skin, prickling under the carefully clandestine consideration that skated around recognition.

“I’d apologise for my brother’s behaviour,” the younger, shorter man was saying, although the sentiment was missing the correct levels of regret, the edge of his lopsided smile genuine, though questioning, light-hearted but without mocking. “If it hadn’t sounded like you were encouraging and thoroughly enjoying the attention. You wouldn’t think so, but he hasn’t been able to shut up about….”

Jaime cleared his throat, and the man turned around with a sigh so that Jaime could stop trying to block Brienne’s larger form from unwanted view. Having managed to scurry back into his jeans, Brienne was still frozen in place, though the shock of being discovered almost in the act hadn’t done anything yet to soften his arousal. “Can you give us a minute here?”

“I’d love to give you an entire hour so that you and the good doctor can finish connecting but they want to talk to you upstairs about Tommen,” he paused, gathering his thoughts and releasing them with a snort that meant everything to Jaime and nothing to her. “ _She_ called a few minutes ago and gave you guardianship for the night. For what it’s worth.”

Becoming an unwanted spectator to family politics, Brienne silently slid off the bench, the tears that had been pushed away welling up once more. Reaching for the puddle of forsaken material pooling around her feet, she searched for something, anything to occupy her head, hands, and heart while Jaime blinked through the dropped bombshell like it had fogged up the air. She was alone in her grief now, more so than before, only remembering to check her phone after she had retrieved and hurriedly pulled her clothes back on. There was only one message.

The brothers were still talking, though their words faded into the background as the sound of her father’s voice, full of apologies and endearments, began to overwhelm the internal barriers that had been keeping her from breaking. A sob rose in her throat, turning Jaime’s head, ignoring the nightmare their pleasant dream had become, to take Brienne into his arms one last time, careful, comforting, and real, before he disappeared for good.

He whispered something that sounded like a reiteration of the invite to take a drive with him some day, but it was more likely just nonsense that her brain and libido were fighting to make sense of. She replied with an equally undistinguishable murmur of farewell and good luck, though the tiny noises elicited another snort from the man still standing in the doorway, studying the ruins of a bygone era, his hands in his pockets.

“Are you decent?” he asked nonchalantly, as if time wasn’t of the essence.

“Never,” Jaime volleyed back, matching his brother’s tone. “But we’re both dressed.”

“That’ll have to do, then,” he sighed, rocking on his heels and stealing a glance over his shoulder. “It was nice to meet you, Brienne. I’d shake your hand, for taking such good care of my brother, but I can guess where they’ve been so, please forgive my rudeness.” He glanced between them, clearly sensing something neither her nor Jaime were aware of, and sighed. “If you want to kiss her goodbye that much, I can turn my back again.”

“That w-won’t be necessary,” she stuttered, snatching back her hand as she felt Jaime’s fingers accidentally brush hers, skin against skin once again sending up stinging sparks. “Your family needs you both now and I really should be getting back to mine. I promised…”

“We can’t have you breaking a promise, can we?” Jaime muttered dismissively as he strode past her, his earlier chivalry disappearing to be replaced with the same mannerisms she was familiar with from their many months of squaring off against each other from the comfort of their own cars.

As the door swung closed, the sound of genial laughter filling the deserted corridor crept into her consciousness. “So,” the younger Lannister chuckled, having to take two steps to every one of Jaime’s, their footfalls echoing in and out of earshot. “If you let me know when you want to see her next, I can take the kids off your hands for the night. I mean, it’s the least I can do.”

Brienne knew it would never come to that, that they may never even see each other again, especially if all of the best hands in the hospital couldn’t save two tiny hearts. And even if they did, it would be through glass. He didn’t really want her. He could never want her the way she now realised she had been wanting him. And, now, as it stretched out to extinguish the misplaced mirth, Jaime’s silence spoke volumes.


	5. Chapter Five

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Although the images currently dancing behind his closed eyes weren’t filling him with completely new sensations, being able to use Brienne's name in such an intimate setting was. Calling to her softly, Jaime felt the ripples caressing his buoyed body speed up as she turned to hold him in her gorgeous gaze, his own name echoing back at him. There was no judgement shining back from the deep blue pools surveying him, lashes blinking in time to the beat of his speeding heart, only a heartfelt melancholy which seemed to mirror his own.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't believe that I'm almost at the mid point of this story, it doesn't seem like an entire month has gone past since I started posting. Thank you so much to everyone who has stuck with this so far and I promise this is heading into fluffier, smuttier territory very soon :)

With hindsight, Jaime had often thought that their first afternoon in the hospital had been the signal needed for the seasons to start changing, having already sensed an icy chill in the clouds of unseasonably warm air as he dragged a brave faced Myrcella out into the darkening world. And though Tyrion hadn’t missed the opportunity to tease a little more, passing a few, less than subtle, comments on their drive back into the city, breaking the suffocating silence into more manageable chunks of worry, there had been no true request for further explanation.

Cella was too preoccupied to be paying much attention to the oscillating childish and innuendo laden back and forth between her uncles anyway, now in near constant contact with her mother and various members of the extended Lannister family. Once the initial shock had abated, sometime during the half hour Jaime had been trying to memorise the flurries of freckles that ran the length of the giant blonde in question, his niece had been the one fielding calls from all of the people he didn’t want to talk to, aunts and uncles sending condolences as if the fight had already been lost. Jaime was too angry to traverse the trails of small talk, too frustrated to sit still, tired of pacing up and down the emptying, sterilised corridors, too many emotions bubbling through his caffeine laden blood to sleep. Nevertheless, staring at the highly decorated ceiling, which Cersei had always hated, could only hold his wandering attention for so long. When he finally found himself alone in the living room, his eyelids began to grow heavier as seconds turned into minutes, minutes into hours, slipping into sweeter dreams than he’d expected to find himself, floating in a warm, sapphire sea of tranquillity with her swimming rings around him.

_Brienne._

Although the images currently dancing behind his closed eyes weren’t filling him with completely new sensations, being able to use her name in such an intimate setting was. Calling to her softly, Jaime felt the ripples caressing his buoyed body speed up as she turned to hold him in her gorgeous gaze, his own name echoing back at him. There was no judgement shining back from the deep blue pools surveying him, lashes blinking in time to the beat of his speeding heart, only a heartfelt melancholy which seemed to mirror his own.

Calling to her again, Brienne blushed like there were countless secrets hidden in the whispered word, like reaching out for him in return could set off half a hundred unstoppable chain reactions which would cause them both to drown in the resulting wave of emotion. He could still taste her every time he swallowed, two glasses of priceless whiskey older than she was not potent enough to wash away what little remained of the sweetness resting on the tip of his tongue.

_“Jaime.”_

Though his experience in all things heart shaped was limited, he knew of desire, the lust that had, for a time, enslaved his body and mind with a misinterpreted inferno of intent so strong that it had threatened to consume who he was. Behind the infamous name, beneath the sharp wit and good looks, beyond the cover ups and the scandals and the headlines, there had been a young man ruled by the idea of honour, of family, of love. He had long accepted that _that_ wasn’t who he was anymore, too much had changed and been lost for him to fully embrace a once imagined black and white view of the world. But looking into Brienne’s eyes, it was almost as if he could feel that perceived purity stretching out to comfort him.

“Brienne.”

She was suddenly as naked as he was, maintaining the modesty he’d unknowingly memorised from their earlier chance encounter by swimming around him in smaller and smaller circles, holding his gaze as the ripples spread. She was graceful in a way no woman that large should ever be and when her speckled skin smoothly slid against his, Jaime was unable to stop himself from reacting, hooking an arm around her waist to pull her out of the created current. Gentler than Cersei had the time or patience for, she responded by quietly wriggling forward until not even a finger of water could have slipped between them.

“What do you want, Jaime?” she murmured, her softly swollen lips inadvertently brushing against his more than eager ones as his name dripped from them, feeling Brienne smile as he started to press back in order to show her exactly who it was he wanted.

“Stay with me, Brienne.”

And, as Jaime soon found, night after night, she always did.

**************************

Almost a full week had crawled by before he was given another chance to speak to her, always seeming to enter a room just as Brienne had left it, the brightly burning afterimage fuelling his peaceful nights right when he needed the comfort of her eyes and arms the most. And though they passed each other on a near daily basis, falling back into the language of looks they’d stumbled upon so many months before, his attempt at a smirk kept bouncing off the tense stare that had settled the moment Cersei had swooped into the hospital and started ordering everyone around.

His sister had hardly left Tommen’s bedside since she had landed, the unnatural silence of the intensive care unit becoming deafeningly claustrophobic, as if her presence had caused the delicate atmospheric balance to shift. The resulting pressure had soon settled, aggressively building to a point were Jaime was unable to see sense in sitting at her side any longer. It was easier for him to try and stretch the quietly upheld rules of visitation, flirting and charming the army of nurses running the ward into letting him stay well into the night, overdosing on bad coffee while he read his nephew, _his son_ , the fluffier, filler pieces in the local newspapers. Cella had joined him once or twice, high school history books left abandoned at her feet, as soon as the only consciously cheery child in the ICU decided to extend the hand of friendship.

From the opposite side of the room, Alysanne Tarth was more than a little bruised. Nursing a concussion serious enough to warrant around the clock hospital observation for a few days following her accident, a couple of broken ribs and a shattered forearm that was currently being held together by a handful of surgical screws, her long term diagnosis was, nevertheless, looking better than his own critically comatose relative. It was quickly established that she could, and would, happily outtalk either one of the regular after-hours visitors, following Jaime’s casual mention of his burgeoning friendship with her sister. And, if the colour creeping up Brienne’s cheekbones the next morning as they, almost deliberately, brushed past each other in the corridor was anything to go by, he could only assume all they had shared with little Alys was being passed on with a similar level of excitement as the information had been received.

Jaime didn’t know if it was the little girl’s effortlessly positive attitude to her situation, or the effect the midnight chats were clearly having on his onetime partner in crime, but when the end of the week rolled around and Alys was declared healthy enough to be moved to the children’s ward, he found himself almost sad to see her go. He had to promise her twice that she and her oldest sister could visit at any time, feeling uncharacteristically charitable by extending the invitation to dinner at some point in the indeterminable future, so that Honor could be also introduced, stubbornness appearing to run through the Tarth family like a broken vein in otherwise perfectly patterned marble.

Drawn into Brienne’s sceptical gaze as she was finally allowed to help her sister into a gaudily decorated wheelchair, the pretty pastel ribbons and surgically seamless bows giving away how much concerned care had been put into it, Jaime found himself quietly nodding in agreement to a question which was lurking in the stormy sapphire waters.

_You get uglier every time I see you and I still can’t stop dreaming about you, Brienne._

“I know it doesn’t feel like it today, but he is getting better,” he heard her murmur softly as she and her sister made their way past the foot of Tommen’s bed, pulling Jaime back from losing himself in the half imagined, half realised memories running riot through his exhausted mind. The comforting tone was pitched more for a child’s sensibilities than those of a man grown, though it was impossible for him not to be soothed slightly by the burgeoning bedside manner. “We have to keep him asleep for now, so that that can continue, but we can come back and visit them…him in a couple of days, if you want.”

“Why can’t you bring me up here tomorrow night before you start your shift?” Alys asked sweetly, reminding an accidentally eavesdropping Jaime of Myrcy’s own gently leading questions at a similar age, less demanding than his cousin had ever been. “You could have my pudding cup if we collect my dinner tray on the way.”

“Visiting hours will be over by then, Aly, the nurses aren’t going to let us in.”

“They let Jaime in all the time.”

“That’s because he’s...he’s…” Brienne trailed off with an audible sigh, his attention piquing at the sound of her exasperation. “He thinks he’s charming. And handsome. And he probably bribed them with pastries.”

“Raspberry danish in the morning and gourmet cupcakes after dinner.” Jaime could almost hear the roll of Brienne’s eyes as she was informed of his edible attempts at working the system, the smile suddenly stretching across his face stalling as Alys asked one final question before she could be pushed out of critical condition and back into a world beyond heart rate monitors and sympathetic nurses and ominously waiting crash carts. “Don’t you want to say goodbye to your friend?”

“My…” she tried to glance over her shoulder without him noticing, but he immediately caught her movement with a wink. “Jaime?”

“He drives the big red car we _always_ park opposite or beside at school. And he told me you were friends.”

“Oh.”

“You could also maybe ask him if he would like to go with you to the next Foundation fundraiser?” she continued, tilting her head in order to help emphasise her point. “Dad says I’m allowed to bring one friend so I’m sure you’ll be able to as well. Margie is always too busy to come up for them and Jaime is right here.”

 _Did I just get asked out by an seven year old middle man?_ Instinctually leaning forward into yet another unasked question hanging heavy in the thickening air between them, Jaime rested a hand on top of Tommen’s ghostly motionless one, his heart recklessly skipping a beat at the thought of being able to bicker and tease Brienne without the bitter taste of worry flavouring their actions.

In the circles his own family were prone to orbit, the Tarth Children’s Foundation events were curious points on the social calendar. From what his brother had relayed, they were like sparkling shooting stars which burnt out in silvery trails far from the fires Jaime was used to, although he had never felt the urge to attend one himself. Cersei hadn’t cared for the smell of new money that had always permeated the guest lists, and the lack of society reporters, when accompanied by such acts of charity, had sent her running back into the loving arms of fickle stardom.

Why can’t you say goodnight, sweetheart?

“I don’t think….” Brienne spluttered, giving her changing emotions away even if Jaime couldn’t see or feel how hot she was likely blushing at the innocent, sisterly suggestion. “We shouldn’t bother him with things like that, Aly, not everyone can change their plans at short notice.”

“But it’s so far away!”

“You know, Doc,” he interrupted from his settled seat of vigilance before he had to strain to make sense of Brienne’s stuttering reply, her voice starting to drop down into a timbre that offered no room for any further discussion. “If you just let me know the date of this magnificent family party, rather than talking about my handsome, charming face like I’m not here, we might be able to come to some sort of agreement.”

He grinned, despite the flickering notes of fear reaching out to wind their way around his deepest, darkest thoughts, the futures they had all expected twisting and mutating at an unstoppable rate. “As we’re all such good friends now.”

“ _Jaime_ ,” she chastised, stealing another glance as her whisper of a warning came perilously close to the series of breathless sighs his mind had done its best to hold on to. “Why don’t we talk about this later?”

“ _Brienne_ ,” he purred in reply, one of the many steadily beeping machines in the room slowly beginning to pick up speed as if it could sense the simmering sensation drumming through his veins. “Why don’t we keep talking about it now? I’m not going anywhere.”

Her gaze flickered away, finding great interest in the wall behind him while he read the apology forming in the lines wrinkling her forehead. “I’m…”

“Unless the next words out of your mouth have something to do with you having to wear a dress to these things, I don’t want to hear it.”

Spinning Alys around in a palpably delicious act of defiance, arms crossed and eyes blazing, Brienne locked blue into green, glaring and near growling down at him. The attempt at haughtiness was missing a vital ingredient though, loyalty and honour reflecting back from overworked darkened circles he hadn’t noticed earlier when she was dancing away from his regard, lingering in the shadows. “I’m…going to have to get you an invite if you’re so fixed on attending.”

“Good. See that you do.”

Her eyes narrowed, like they had in the emergency room, confusion mixing with doubt as the reality of what they were agreeing to came crashing through her safety shields. “They’d prefer everyone to come in black tie, but I don’t suppose that will be a problem for someone like you.”

“Not at all,” he smiled, predatorily polite. “But tell me, Doc, is it going to cause you any trouble? All I’ve ever seen you in are scrubs and jeans. Do you even own anything that could be seen as appropriate?”

“I…”

“It’s not until the 24th of next month,” Alys blurted out suddenly, seemingly oblivious to the tension that existed between the only two adults in the room but knowing just when the silence needed filing, nevertheless. “At the Storm’s End Marbrand. In a _ballroom_. And Brie has an amazing friend in High Garden who usually helps with the dresses.”

Jaime raised an eyebrow, if the Tyrell’s were also somehow involved in the altruistic festivity, even without taking into account the luxury hotel chain who’d had close, personal ties to the Lannister family for generations, it was little wonder why Cersei had raged like an unpredictable summer storm every time the Foundation had been praised in conventional, society conversation.

“Don’t think you can turn up to this thing and treat it like a joke just because you are who you are,” Brienne mumbled through his musings. “I can have someone send you the relevant details but it might be better for you to stay away if-”

“No need, Doc, Addam and I go way back. I can find out what I need to without your clumsy intervention.” They exchanged a look that flew straight over the head of the watchful little girl still waiting to be taken downstairs. “I’m still recovering from the last time you collided with me.” Brienne blushed furiously, the colour spiralling around her neck before carefully caressing her face into a shade that couldn’t be concealed, no matter how low she dropped her eyes as she took a second chance at walking through the door. And, as usual, he couldn’t resist throwing out one last parting shot. “Next time you decide to transfer to another forgotten wing of the hospital, let me know. I can always come down and see you sometime.”


	6. Chapter Six

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Brienne was trying to channel all her frustrations into the demanding dilemmas of work, the constant cyclone of solvable problems stopping her from thinking about things that wouldn’t be useful. Though, for all her efforts, it wasn’t helping when she stepped outside the safety net granted by the walls of the hospital. The dreams she had experienced may have been nothing out of the ordinary, but the sense memory of his hands wrapping around her hips, his lips on her skin, and his voice purring wantonly in her ears were all proving to be more difficult to forget than she would have liked. Despite their shared moments of connection she knew that, when the clouds finally cleared and they were, once again, walking down the paths they had chosen to be on, a man like Jaime Lannister would likely only see her as a nonsensical cosmic joke.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to everyone who is supporting this story! It really does mean a lot to me, especially when my doubts start creeping in, to know that there are people out there who are enjoying reading this (I hope).
> 
> This chapter marks the half way point.

Tommen was awakened three days after Brienne had left Jaime, and his inappropriately timed innuendo laden coping methods, in the paediatric intensive care unit. In her, albeit limited, experience, the procedure would have come with the caveat that things were likely going to take a long time to get back to normal. His internal injuries were a worry to all involved and Brienne had done her best to stay away from a family in crisis, the little voice in her head screaming out of how she would only be taking advantage if she re-visited a thoughtlessly ferocious one time thing. So she hadn't been present for the furious fit Cersei had thrown the night before on learning the most recent update, a car accident keeping Brienne busy downstairs, but the slamming doors, nurse intimidation and threatening of multiple law suits would probably go down in hospital history. Security was eventually called, according to Pia, but even being escorted to her car wouldn't change Cersei's distinct lack of understanding around how dedicated the team were in making sure the little boy got to go home.

It had also been three days since her youngest sister had been declared healthy enough to be moved out of the same terrifyingly tense ward. The majority of her own worry had lifted as soon as reports that Alys was starting to make good progress started to trickle in, even if she was constantly in trouble with the physiotherapists for punching above her weight. It was a family characteristic, Brienne assured the team, when questioned, though the fighter living inside her own head was now occasionally not strong enough to push away the flickering of Jaime’s knowing smile. And, much to her current despair and future fear, time had seemed to ominously fly by since her sister had done what Brienne couldn't and asked her parking lot nemesis to one of the most important events on the Tarth family calendar. Since then, Alys had become dead set on providing her with a steady countdown to one of the only days of the year where all three Tarth girls were expected to act like the perfect ladies they hadn’t been raised to be.

Brienne was trying to channel all her frustrations over the latter into the demanding dilemmas of work, the constant cyclone of solvable problems stopping her from thinking about things that wouldn’t be useful. Though, for all her efforts, it wasn’t helping when she stepped outside the safety net granted by the walls of the hospital. The dreams she had experienced may have been nothing out of the ordinary, but the sense memory of his hands wrapping around her hips, his lips on her skin, and his voice purring wantonly in her ears were all proving to be more difficult to forget than she would have liked. Despite their shared moments of connection she knew that, when the clouds finally cleared and they were, once again, walking down the paths they had chosen to be on, a man like Jaime Lannister would likely only see her as a nonsensical cosmic joke.

_Lannisters lie. You know he wanted nothing to do with you. And he never will._

And then a near illegible scrawl of a note was passed to her that third morning by the newest member of their nursing team, an optimistically monikered blonde named Joy, the understanding provided by Jaime’s two short lines sending a wave of relief over Brienne like the first warm breath of spring. But after the crushing weight of concern had started to lift off her shoulders, the after effects of an emotionally exhausting night shift came rushing back in. The faces of the drunks, lovers, sinners and saints they’d treated and streeted, along with those that would never take another step outside the hospital walls, reached out to fill the empty space left behind. And the energy she had expended running between triage and trauma rooms, in the hope that she could make a difference to someone, somewhere, meant Brienne was more grateful for the chocolate cream filled pastry Jaime had insisted be delivered alongside the note.

With Joy still hovering at her elbow, as if waiting for a reply to the message, Brienne’s rising need to distance herself from the Lannister family started to outweigh the tickling want to tell him exactly what she’d been thinking about every time she tried to close her eyes.

Melancholy twitched along her sugar stained lips as she swallowed the first amazing bite, knowing that with Jaime leaving her world soon, taking the rest of his conspicuously beautiful family with him, they’d be propelled back into a life of silent arguments and safe distances, blood banks and ballrooms nothing more than sporadic waves in an otherwise calm ocean. And, in spite of everything she now knew, and everything she still assumed about this uncle and brother and whatever else, some part of Brienne wanted to drown in that sea of _Jaime._

As hard as she tried to put it behind her, the feeling lingered as the warmly colourful autumn turned to winter, hints of yearning swirling with the unexpectedly early snow to mix with all the insecurity and inhibition that had followed her like an ever increasing shadow from adolescence to adulthood. Deftly swerving the seemingly never ending parade of Casterly Rock’s richest, as well as Alys’ daily pleas to visit the third floor, Brienne spent the next few days settling back into the cycle of work and home, life and death, ecstasy and tragedy. That was until it seemed like some higher power had other plans for her.

And Jaime.

Maybe if it hadn’t have been a particularly wet and woeful evening, or maybe if she hadn’t spent the last five minutes of her working day unwillingly eavesdropping on the nursing staff animatedly discussing their weekend plans, Brienne would have simply slid into the comfortable leather seat of her borrowed Jeep and driven right past the man sulking and pacing in front of the hospital. But, as it was, she found herself taking pity on him, inwardly cursing the cruelty of kindness while sidling up to the curb and rolling down the passenger side window. “Have you been stood up?” she called out to the bedraggled figure trying to find shelter against the unforgiving perimeter wall, hoping the joke masked the nerves bubbling up to take a hold of her tongue.

“Ha, fucking, ha,” Jaime grumbled in reply, sounding as far away as he could. “My brother should be along soon so there’s no need to pretend that you’re worried about me.”

“I’m not pretending,” she hissed. Knowing she was going against every single rule she’d written for herself over the past week, Brienne still reached over and opened the car door into the freezing wind and rain, sensing the snow in the air just waiting to fall and blanket them all in the unique purity of chaos. “Jaime, it’s not worth catching your death out here when I’m going your way anyway.”

“ _All_ the way?” he smirked, shoving his hands into the pockets of his sodden woollen coat, continuing the pretence that the worsening weather wasn’t affecting him at all. Brienne could see the darkening rosy tinge caressing his cheekbones, though, alongside the icicles fighting to form in his hair and the slight chattering of his teeth even in the bloom of artificially brightened twilight. “You shouldn’t be making promises you can’t keep, Doc. Don’t they teach you that kind of thing before you’re let loose on the general public?”

_I didn’t think I promised you anything._ She blushed at the recollection of him sinking to his knees, pupils blown and breath ragged while she tingled and wanted and burned. “They also taught me that exposure is no laughing matter,” she scowled, holding his narrowing eyes with a frustrated fury that matched his own. “And the longer you stay out here the more likely it is that you’ll find that out first hand.”

“Have you forgotten that we’re in Storm’s End?” he scoffed, running a trembling hand through the hair sticking to his forehead as he stalked along the sidewalk, climbing into the car and closing the door to the rest of the unforgivingly frigid world. “Outside a hospital, of all places.”

“I know where we are, Jaime. I practically live here.”

“Funny that, I was beginning to think that you’d been whisked back to St Baelor’s mid-week to work on your bedside manner.” He grinned, but it was more a predatory barring of his teeth than anything resembling true delight and Brienne resolved herself to the fact that she may not have had the worst half hour of her day yet. “Or have you been hiding in the blood bank this whole time, waiting for something _exciting_ to happen again?”

She sighed deeply, closing her eyes to wish she’d had the foresight to keep her coat on instead of instinctively throwing it onto the backseat, each passing second pushing her closing to the edge of driving off and leaving Jaime to suffer in his weather inappropriate clothing. “Just shut up and put on your seatbelt.”

“How are you ever going to handle spending a night with me if after less than two minutes together you’re this irritated?” came his soft murmur, the squelching sound of waterlogged wool on leather startling Brienne into playing with the heating controls. “Ballroom etiquette generally frowns on couples coming to blows between waltzes.”

“I’m not…” she started, attempting to find interest in any one of the Jeep’s state of the art features in order not to glance across at him. If she did, Brienne knew, she would lose whatever game they’d started playing. “First, do no harm.”

“The Hippocratic oath?”

"Believe me, it might be the only thing staying my hand."

He barked out an unamused laugh. "It’s been twelve days and I still have some scratches healing across my shoulder blades that may prove otherwise. Do you want to take a look at them after you take me home? Maybe prescribe some ointment or something else, like _kissing_ it better?"

“I-I’m…sorry?” Brienne stuttered, self-consciously pulling at the neck of her sweater as she lifted her head to find him regarding her with an inquisitorial glare. The bitten and bruised skin lurking out of reach of his searching eyes was now a scattered pattern of yellows and greens like she’d been the living canvas for a painter with a love of golden summer fields. They were the kind of brilliant hues only found in paintings, the kind that were entombed in the best galleries in Kings Landing, where the knights would always be brave and the maids always fair. Not bullied or bad mouthed, accused or avoided.

“Why?” Jaime demanded, bringing her back from the verge of falling into her thoughts, the word dangerous enough on its own without the growl that seemed to be rising up his throat, threatening to pierce through the quiet evening like a roll of thunder. “Do you really think I’ve had nothing better to do than sit and wait for a repeat performance?”

“Of course not,” she snapped, fighting against the familiar feeling of heat flickering across her cheeks, while he continued to berate her with the unreadable glints of darkening emerald gold glittering in his gaze. “Every other person who has the misfortune of spending a significant amount of time here tends to have a selective memory about why they had to visit us in the first place. It makes it easier, I guess, for parents,” she paused to swallow a lump of second hand emotion, her father’s shaking hands and stepmother’s tears still fresh in her memory, turning over the ignition only to hear it refuse to do more than cough out a stuttered imitation of life. “And guardians. It’s best if they don’t have to keep touching upon that worry over and over again, when they’re sitting behind a desk or talking to their friends or even-”

“Did you learn that pearl of wisdom from the same textbook you were paraphrasing the last time we were alone?” Jaime snorted in surprise. “Or have you actually realised that sharing a personal experience stops you from being as boring as you are ugly?”

She sniffed at that, though she was not sure if it was at the attack on herself or the institution she had given herself to. "Despite the kind of people you might be more used to spending time with, just because I’m not another spontaneously reckless Lannister celebutante groupie doesn’t automatically make me dull. Dozens of lives are saved every day because we have sensible, tried and tested procedures in place to help us decide how best to react in an emergency situation.”

“And where did you get that from? The hospital induction packet?” Jaime retorted effortlessly, inadvertently catching her attention by fidgeting with clasp of the glove box resting directly above his knees. A second later, his experienced reflexes were just quick enough to catch most of the mess of candy bars and CDs and toys that came pouring out of the much too small space. Brienne merely huffed out another sigh as she watched him evaluate the wealth of new information that had been dumped in his lap, her tidiness at work not extending into the rest of her life. “Though, in your case, are you sure you’re not using ‘sensible’ as a euphuism for ‘pig-headed’? Or maybe ‘idealistic’? Or even ‘dependable?”

“I’m not sure that last one is necessarily a bad thing.”

“Oh, I beg to disagree, Doc.”

“By this point I think I’d be stupid not to expect anything else,” she smiled sardonically, still refusing to look him directly in the eye, though it was becoming more and more difficult to keep up the façade. But as she leaned over with the intention of removing a few of the Tarth girls’ favourite things from the reach of both his inquiring mind and grasping hands, Brienne brushed against his freezing fingers fumbling with the wrapper of one of Alys’ forsaken chocolate bars and she forgot the need to hide and parry from behind her walls. “Gods, Jaime, how long were you standing out there?”

He shrugged, letting her take a hold of his wrists to push them further under the passenger side heater. “I got kicked out after visiting hours by your new nurse manager. Apparently my brand of charm needs more time to work than she was willing to give me tonight.”

“For Seven’s sake,” she muttered under her breath as Jaime fluttered his eyelashes up at her, exhaling a contentedly heavy breath as she cradled his hands between hers and began to rub them together. “You should take off your coat.”

“If you want something from me, Brienne, you can just come out with it,” he murmured, the first genuine smile she’d seen from him in an age brightening his face as if he could better sense her weakness the closer she shuffled towards him. “I’m not going to judge you.”

“Just take off your coat,” she repeated firmly, but it was too late and no sooner had the flooded woollen cocoon slipped off his shoulders Jaime was unbuttoning his damply clinging shirt, the tricolour plaid giving way to defined lines of muscle, a hint of silver and gold fur and, thankfully, a dry undershirt. “That’s enough now, Jaime,” she found herself mumbling, the chastisement leaving her lips far softer than she had intended. But she was growing frustrated enough by his continued smirking and squirming to feel forced to ball her fists as he finished removing layers of unwanted material, the slight pressure of her fingernails allowing her to temporarily escape the moment.

“What?” he asked and she could almost hear the grin hiding in his tone, absently throwing his discarded clothing onto the back seat. His thrice-damned smile only grew wider as he wrapped his warming hands around hers and Brienne instinctively lowered her gaze. “I thought you wanted to help me out of my wet clothes.”

“Not like that.”

“Is there any other way?”

“I was trying…” she shook her head, thankfully coming back to her senses as she tried the key again, the gentle purr of the car never sounding sweeter. “To be considerate.”

“I didn’t think we were friends, after the way you’ve been avoiding me.”

Brienne frowned. “There’s a hoodie behind you if you get cold. It should fit.”

“Well you certainly don’t need it. Even a blind man could see how hot and bothered you are right now.”

“I’m hot because I’ve had the heating on full blast for the last few minutes and the only thing I’m bothered about is you putting your seat belt on so we can go.”

With a look that seemed to say more than he was willing to admit to, Jaime, finally, did what he was told, though his tongue didn’t let up. “If you prefer having me restrained, Doc, I must have at least one pair of handcuffs lying around at home.” Out of the corner of her eye, she caught the flash of pink swiping along his lower lip, moving to suck the flesh into his mouth as his eyes ran the length of her torso before letting go of the glistening surface and setting her to burn once more. “For after we’ve exhausted a few other options, of course.”

“N-not interested.”

“Really? I was _interesting_ enough when you couldn’t keep your hands off me.”

“That was…”

“Was it?”

With her lips trembling from holding back everything she couldn’t yet spill, and maybe never would, Brienne turned to look at him, falling into the depths of his green gaze as she felt her own eyes widen, forgetting to blink or breathe while they took the time to study each other properly, knowing that her thoughts would be written all over her face. Struggling to focus on anything else but the steady pounding of her heart in her ears and the way his attention kept flickering down to the overgenerous smattering of freckles across her cheeks, she took a breath and tapped the accelerator. The car growled like there was a beast lurking beneath the bonnet, feeding on the irritation that ebbed and flowed with each word her passenger uttered. “Don’t joke about that like it was easy for me to do.”

Jaime raised an eyebrow as his eyes blazed, a skeleton of a fading scar running through the pale hair, tiny white lines that she felt forced to follow with her eyes as she had her fingers the week before last. “And when exactly was it hard for you? When you were moaning my name like you enjoyed the taste? Or maybe when we were skin on skin and you couldn’t get enough. Or maybe it was when you saw my face again and immediately tried to turn in the opposite direction. Was that when it got _difficult_?”

He set his jaw and she pulled her gaze away again, pushing the resisting engine forward as she tried to work out if the snarl that reached her ears came from either man or beast. “I wanted…”

“Look at me when you lie.”

She did, hoping the anger burning behind her eyes would force him to cower and back down. “I wanted to…upstairs and then we…” He was looking at her as if he had grown used to sitting just as he was now, staring at someone important and waiting for her to toss what they had done aside. She knew that feeling all too well. And she could not lie to him. Or herself. “I’m sorry.”

He considered the truth in the fumbling mess she’d just spat out, eventually making a noise in the back of his throat like he’d heard enough. “Take me home then, Doc. And I expect this to not be the last time we see each other?”

It was a dangerous game to tempt Jaime Lannister and to use her heart as a playing piece. But two had been in that blood bank clawing for a connection. “I suppose we could carpool the kids to school when they are ready.”

He smiled slowly, a sudden flash of levity reaching out to brighten the familiar challenge hiding in the green like a benevolent snake in the grass. “I think they’d like that.”

Brienne opened her mouth to agree, wondering when exactly she should tell Alys without letting the resulting excitement interfere in her recovery, but as her thoughts quickly strayed to the fact that the children might not be the only ones happy with that arrangement, she found herself lost for words. Mumbling something about exchanging numbers to help with the logistics, she watched as Jaime snuggled into her hoodie and breathed deeply, the intimacy of the act worrying her enough to stall the engine.

It was, she thought, going to be a long drive.


	7. Chapter Seven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Having successfully brought Brienne up to a stutteringly confused simmer, Jaime spent the next few minutes of their journey listening to her inattentively hum along with the recently revived radio while he sent a barrage of texts berating his brother for his shoddy timekeeping. But even though a layer of tension remained in the enclosed space, keeping Brienne's fingers nervously drumming on the steering wheel, it was almost pleasant to settle into a state of companionable agreement with only her slightly out of tune voice ringing in his ears. And as they turned onto the main road, the engine throwing out sporadic growls of protest, somewhere in the back of his mind Jaime absently began to wonder if this was how it felt to have a particularly vivid dream burst into a Technicolor reality.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not sure a great deal happens in this chapter, there's plenty of dialogue and banter though.
> 
> Anything you recognise, as always, doesn't belong to me.
> 
>  
> 
> Banner by justme. Thank you so much for this! :)
> 
> [](http://s26.photobucket.com/user/grandmummy/media/image_7.jpg.html)

Having successfully brought Brienne up to a stutteringly confused simmer, Jaime spent the next few minutes of their journey listening to her inattentively hum along with the recently revived radio while he sent a barrage of texts berating his brother for his shoddy timekeeping. But even though a layer of tension remained in the enclosed space, keeping Brienne's fingers nervously drumming on the steering wheel, it was almost pleasant to settle into a state of companionable agreement with only her slightly out of tune voice ringing in his ears. And as they turned onto the main road, the engine throwing out sporadic growls of protest, somewhere in the back of his mind Jaime absently began to wonder if this was how it felt to have a particularly vivid dream burst into a Technicolor reality.

"If you'd care to listen, I know a short cut."

She snorted. "I've lived here far longer than you, Jaime, and I know there aren't any short cuts. It's a straight road home."

"Through the most populated area of the Stormlands on a Friday night," he smiled as Brienne sighed and grumbled wordlessly under her breath, practically gleeful that she wouldn't give him a single inch without a fight. He wasn't patient enough, though, to wait for her to step into the field of play while they snuck furtive glances at each other in between noisy swipes of the windscreen wipers. "Where's your sense of adventure, Doc? Don't tell me you left it back at the hospital, along with your ugly shoes and giant panties?"

"An emergency room is no place for..." she huffed unsteadily, searching, the angry flush radiating up her neck luminescent in the glow from the sparsely spaced streetlights. Pausing, for what Jaime felt was a second too long, she shook her head as if the slight motion could bring the missing justification to the surface. The already overtaxed elastic band holding back her hair yielded a handful of straw blonde strands that he would have liked to wrap around his fingers and push out of her eyes.

"Daring?" he suggested with an arched brow when the silence became too much for him to bear, doing all he could to prod her into attacking.

"Frivolity," she batted back almost quicker than he'd been expecting, his immediate smile wholly unbidden.

"I guess you don't put up decorations for Winterfest, then? Or give out toys and candy at Halloween?"

She worried along her ravaged lower lip, habitually tearing into the tender flesh to make the delicate movements of her teeth and tongue momentarily mesmerising. Her accompanying glare, though, was as pointed as he'd seen it. "If you seriously think I could be that cold towards sick children, then you can walk home."

Jaime threw up his hands in mock surrender, smirking as he caught sight of her cobalt coloured ire smouldering in the rear view mirror. "The thing is, Doc," he replied. "I don't think we reached that point during our 'getting to know you' chat. Do you want to try again?"

"Just look at how well that ended up the first time," she muttered darkly, Jaime's bark of laughter taking both of them by surprise. "I only meant...I didn't..." Brienne trailed off with another shake of her head, gently decelerating to a complete standstill behind a long winding line of stationary traffic. "Smart arse."

Jaime only laughed harder. "Maybe by the time we next see each other, you'll have figured out how important listening is in your line of work," he told her between snorts of smug amusement. “I-"

"If you say 'I told you so', I swear to the Seven-"

"You'll do what?” he purred, shifting and shuffling in his seat so that his view of the city was slowly replaced with one that was becoming just as familiar, her head turning only when he coughed as the seatbelt tightened across his chest. “You've already admitted that you don’t want to hurt me.”

“No,” Brienne spat out the word, though the hand that reached out and ran down his side to release the restrictive latch was wonderfully, almost terrifyingly, tender, her fingertips ghosting over the thin layers protecting his torso from the heat of her body. Jaime exhaled heavily as, in her fumbling, she brushed a sliver of exposed skin lurking along his stomach, the twitching muscle pushing into her touch even as she pulled her hand away, blood being redirected from his head to his equally twitching cock.

"Just because I…we…I-,” she breathed, the timbre of her voice setting his heart to race like an adolescent awaiting his first date. “Just because I shouldn’t do something, doesn’t mean I don’t...”

“Want to,” he finished as Brienne faltered again, her darting eyes betraying the thoughts that were overriding her normal sensibilities. “There’s no shame in that, Doc. Unless we’re talking about you throwing me out into a blizzard.”

“Jaime,” she warned his returning wink, as if whispering his name would be all it took to steer the conversation back towards safer ground, her soft murmur turning into a growl as he persisted in playing with the radio. "Gods, I've had better behaved teenagers in that seat. Would you just pick a station and stick with it?"

Jaime felt his smile crinkle at the corners of his mouth, drumming out a familiar beat on the dashboard and catching the end of her well-aimed glare. "You probably don't remember this song the first time around," he pointed out just to have something say, not wanting to remind himself of their not insignificant difference in age, but doing so anyway.

"I remember it fine," Brienne sighed, one eye remaining fixed on him as Jaime snuggled into her perfectly fitted hoodie, occasionally burrowing his nose into the fraying collar as if trying to reacquaint himself with the very scent of her. Each time she caught him inhaling, it looked like a fresh wave of heat ran the long, lean, length of her, setting her skin alight, maybe even thinking of waking up from her next afternoon nap at work wrapped up in him.

It was a heady thought and, as the snow began to fall in earnest, the weather became a welcome distraction for them both. Brienne, lost for words when it came to dealing with him outside of the comfort of the hospital, suddenly showed she didn't have the same problem when it came to the other members of her family. "Alys is going to be so disappointed she's missing the first snowfall of winter," she told him, her voice barely above a whisper. "There's not going to be too many years left where she's going to get excited about something as simple as snow."

Jaime silently agreed, listening to the string of nervous conversation that kept falling from Brienne's mouth, though her eyes never left the gridlocked road. The likely length of her sister's recovery was no great surprise, given how many doctors he'd spoken to over the last fortnight, though neither were the rivers of relief flowing through each of Brienne's words. Hearing about her impressively normal holiday traditions amused him far more than he expected, and it only felt right, after she'd described the family celebration, that Alys should be home well in time to enjoy the festivities. Brienne spoke of the nurses, too, barely giving him a chance to say a word in defence before launching into a near tirade about how whole groups of them had already fallen in love with him, how Joy kept bringing her pastries after night shifts, though she didn't have to, how she was so relieved to hear about Tommen.

Jaime talked back when she paused for breath, teasing, interrupting, cajoling, the tension lifting and descending in equal measure as he filled her in on the most recent developments with his younger charges. He'd grown tired of the rotating cycle of therapists who rarely had something new to say, but that didn't stop him from sharing the few encouraging notes from the hospital's speech and language specialist, Missandei, or the two physios, who were already impressed with Tommen's attitude. Brienne nodded in the right places, listening to him vent and spill, like he'd less than patiently done for her, getting to know each other beyond the hard, physical want and what was in the eye of the beholder.

Pushing away the empty feeling that grew in his gut at the idea of going home again to a place of quiet, now that Myrcella had gone back to her mother, avoiding the revisited internal investigations splashed over the papers and the braver journalists who'd begun to lurk outside his building, Jaime realised that for all their distance, he did know more about Brienne than he could have ever guessed. He'd known when she was mad or elated every time they had entered into their chosen arena, the remnants of the previous day’s successes or tragedies weighing heavy on her broad shoulders. He knew the emotions hiding in her gorgeous eyes, every habitual response, good or bad. And now they were just filling in the gaps, making sure there was more to their connection than need and despair and hope.

"Alys wants to come and see him before she's sent home."

Jaime raised an eyebrow, asking for the whole truth in that announcement, wanting her to admit that it was more than what it seemed. "Friday night there's a movie in the parent and children's room on the third floor."

"I know. I helped set that up."

"Then come."

The invitation lay on the air as Brienne turned away to focus on the regularly spaced streetlights, the waning crescent moon, the soft splatter of snow on the screen, silence falling over them both once more.

"If you're not so interested in Finding Nemo, we could leave them and get some dinner," Jaime eventually offered. "Just as a dry run for the ball, of course. Addam sent me all the information for the event, but I still need to know when you want me to pick you up and what colour your dress is."

"It's blue. And you don't need to pick me up, I'll meet you there. This isn't prom."

"Funny you should mention that-"

"No."

They had barely moved in the last few minutes, but as she cut his line of inquiry off to creep forward again, Jaime pointed out their next left would take them onto his short cut, feeling forced to call that last exchange a draw.

"Don't you trust me?" he purred. And, though she didn't answer, the sound of the indicator felt sweeter than any argument she could have started in that moment, the car turning onto freshly fallen snow a heartbeat later.

Brienne was likely a steady driver even in the best of conditions, on another day he would have called her boring, but not with the weather deteriorating around them the way it was. If it continued, Jaime doubted they would be able to easily make it back to his apartment, never mind any further out. She was also right to bring up Christmas, since, it seemed, no matter how far away it felt, some of the houses they passed had already put their decorations up, the twinkling lights alternatively turning the piling snow blue and red and green. The colours flashed over her face, too, as Jaime caught himself watching as each one bathed her in shades that were uglier than the last.

When he looked back later, Jaime wouldn't know why that moment felt the right time to tell her the secret that had been niggling at him since before the accident. But there was something about Brienne that he trusted implicitly.

"He's mine, I think," he exhaled into the car. "Tommen. My son."

"I know," she whispered in response, her eyes staying firmly fixed on the disappearing road, though he guessed she must have at least been able to feel his stare boring holes in her cheek. "Or at least I think I did. We're taught that the simplest explanation is usually the right one and your blood types were too much of a perfect match for it to be a coincidence." Much to Jaime's surprise, she didn't sound upset or disgusted by the turn of events, maintaining a healthy level of detachment he'd yet to see from her in a more professional context. He doubted she would have ever had to deal with such a matter before, though he did wonder. "He's going to be okay. Whatever happened before now...he's going to be okay."

"It's over between me and her." Jaime let another unspoken truth escape, not yet able to accept that he was trying to find a way to tell Brienne that he hadn't cheated with her in the blood bank, that what they'd done wasn't necessarily a mistake. "It has been for years. We should have-"

"Do you honestly think I'm going to tell anyone?" Brienne spluttered, hitting the breaks a little too forcefully and holding onto the wheel until they had stopped skidding to a messy halt. "It's none of my godsdamn business what happened between you...you and your cousin. And it shouldn't be anyone else's either. Tommen needs to be left alone to heal and grow up without that hanging over him for the rest of his life!"

Jaime snorted as she turned to face him, the space suddenly feeling too small for both the truth and her outburst. "You're one in a million, Doc."

She rolled her eyes. "Shut up. I know you care about him far too much to allow just anyone know...oh."

"You can turn right at the next intersection."

"Jaime." She shot him an unreadable look, part furious confusion, part wary surprise, her teeth beginning to work along the swelling surface of her lower lip again as he could almost see the wheels spinning in her mind. "You better not be leading me on a wild dragon chase," she grumbled instead of pushing him further, before turning over the cooling engine despite their heated discussion having raised the temperature inside the car to that of a pleasant summers day.

"I wouldn't dream of it," Jaime drawled, rolling his sleeves up to his elbows and settling back in his seat as Brienne cleared the windscreen of snow, gazing down the all but empty road. "Dragons aren't too fond of the cold from what I've read."

"Gods save me from wise cracking know-it-alls," Brienne sighed, keeping their pace slower than before as Jaime flicked through song after song that were, to his ears, undistinguishable from noise, to find any update on the swirling snow storm. "I can't seem to move for them today."

"And you still offered me a ride? I feel honoured."

"You'd have been a snowman by now," she pointed out, swallowing a spark of amusement that threatened to burst into contagious laughter, his own smile completely unwarranted though equally uncontrollable.

"I suppose I should thank you," he mused as they crawled closer to the city sprawled across the horizon. "How about you let me repay the debt over drinks?"

Their world may have been slowly disappearing under a thick blanket of white, but Jaime had been on that road too many times to not notice the half covered garish blue and gold sign directing drivers to the best selection of ales this side of Winterfell, the very prospect of a roaring fire and a full stomach enough to temporarily rein in his sharp tongue.

"That's...but hardly...why?"

"The Rose and Crown is only a few hundred yards ahead, it seems as good a place as any to wait out the snow."

"Do you really think that that's a good idea right now? A pub?" she challenged, as the crackling voice coming through her speakers droned on about unprecedented inches in too few hours, a recommendation coming that only necessary journeys should be attempted. "We shouldn't stop just because you've seen a sign. If you're thirsty, there's water in the glove box and probably soda, too."

"Your car hates the snow," Jaime pointed out, carefully rifling through the snacks and toys Brienne had snatched out of his grasp earlier. "And considering how many accidents there's going to be tonight, we should definitely stop just because I've seen a sign for a warm, award winning watering hole."

As she thought over his attempts at persuading her stubbornness into stepping down from a fight, he unwrapped and took a bite of a candy bar he hadn't seen for years. "I'm betting neither one of us have had dinner, either."

Her stomach growled assertively, her hand slamming down over it as if that alone could block out the noise. "And if we get stuck, then what?"

Jaime shrugged. "They have a bed and breakfast attached."

"I'm not-"

"Come on now, Doc. You've already seen me naked, don't tell me you draw the line at potentially having to share a room?"

Her eyes narrowed, flicking from him to the road and back again as they hesitated at the entrance to The Rose and Crown's icy parking lot. "One drink?"

"Are you really so slow that I have to ask you out again?"

"That's not what's happening here, Jaime."

"So you're in my head now?" he grinned salaciously, grateful for any chance to look her up and down. "Tell me what I'm thinking then."

Brienne only blushed, making him laugh. "One drink," she repeated firmly as he choked back another peal and they turned.


	8. Chapter Eight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The parking lot was more like an ice rink than she'd anticipated, but even if the path from Brienne’s ill prepared car into the warm, golden, flickering light was treacherous, she, begrudgingly, had to admit that The Rose and Crown appeared to be just as hospitable as Jaime promised. Pushing aside the numerous problematic scenarios that could arise from having even a single drink with the man who'd been haunting her steps, and her dreams, for far too long to be considered appropriate for such an unobtainable crush, she took a deep breath, freezing her lungs in the process, and slammed the car door shut.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't quite believe this has now reached the three quarter stage, thank you for all the support so far and I hope you continue to enjoy the fluffier, smuttier path this story is about to turn onto.
> 
> Fair warning, I have fallen into at least one giant cliche here to keep these two together as long as possible.

The parking lot was more like an ice rink than she'd anticipated, but even if the path from Brienne’s ill prepared car into the warm, golden, flickering light was treacherous, she, begrudgingly, had to admit that The Rose and Crown appeared to be just as hospitable as Jaime promised. Pushing aside the numerous problematic scenarios that could arise from having even a single drink with the man who'd been haunting her steps, and her dreams, for far too long to be considered appropriate for such an unobtainable crush, she took a deep breath, freezing her lungs in the process, and slammed the car door shut.

"Come on, Doc," Jaime called to her from over his shoulder, somehow managing to keep his balance despite skidding as he turned to grin. "Unless you were lying before and want me to-"

"Of course I wasn't," she snapped, feeling more and more frustrated with herself as he continued to stare. Stomping and sliding across the untouched surface towards him, her battered combat boots proving no better than Jaime's sneakers at conquering the beginnings of winter, Brienne grunted as she threw out an arm and caught hold of an abandoned snow dusted car to keep from falling. Jaime's continued cat like grace was both highly irritating and fascinating enough so that she had trouble tearing her eyes away. "What exactly is it that you think I want from you? I've had to work hard to get where I am and no matter how interesting your family might be to the media, I'm not about to throw away my career for a chance to become synonymous with 'inside sources.' And, before you say anything, I don't need your money either."

"No," Jaime replied evenly, his movements as slow as molasses and just as potent, a hint of arrogant amusement creeping into his tone. "Because you're a fucking heiress working in a hospital emergency department. It's like something out of a movie of the week, only, in that universe, you'd have more than just a firm ass, astonishing eyes and an unbreakable moral code, because it's not much of a story if the star is ugly."

"It's so refreshing to have someone just come out and say that to my face instead of tiptoeing around the obvious." She knew there was a compliment or two hiding amongst his smirking observations, but Brienne wasn't in the mood to join in whatever game Jaime was playing and wondering what such things meant in light of their desperate scramble to satisfy the rough, hard, burning need for the other would only add to her confusion. Worse still, despite the sarcasm dripping off her every word and what he had confirmed in the car, her feelings remained so strong that a part of her, the part that didn't feel uneasy at being included in the secrets and lies, wanted nothing more than to pick up where they had left off. Watching as Jaime pushed his hands into his pockets, looking almost at ease in the surroundings while the streetlight he'd paused under bathed him in a lustrous halo of artificial illumination, she tried to push away her swirling mess of confused thoughts. "Can we go inside now or do we need to go another couple of rounds before we-"

"Fuck." Jaime was sprinting across the parking lot almost before Brienne could realise that she had started falling, her ankle twisting as she pushed off the car and took a step forward, expecting to land on her arse on the frozen ground but somehow ending up in Jaime's arms instead. "If I'd known you were so clumsy, I would have never risked getting in the car with you. Are you okay?"

Brienne shook her head. How he could ask something like that when his breath was currently fogging in front of her face, close enough for her to watch each and every snowflake melt in his hair and eyelashes, close enough to rest his arms around her shoulders and waist as if he was about to dip her in a bow, close enough to kiss, was beyond her. He looked like a dream come to life and she wanted so much to believe in the flickers of flirtation that were dancing alongside a deepening concern for her wellbeing, all that she was still trying to process taking a back seat to the novel sensations his searching eyes were sparking. "I'm...fine. Thank you."

"Come on then. I doubt this place has twenty four hour room service."

"We're not staying," Brienne felt it necessary to remind him as Jaime shrugged and lifted her back onto her feet, his strength surprising her all over again. They walked, side by side, arm in arm, twenty or so yards towards the ivy clad archway welcoming patrons into the pub.

It was hardly late but, inside the restored farmhouse with its lovingly reclaimed timber beams and roaring open fire, there wasn't more than a dozen snow covered travellers and laughing locals. The brunette behind the bar looked no older than her late twenties, though a single glance was enough to realise that she was the one in charge of the plaid clad team serving drinks or circling with plates of food. It took the staff a while to call attention to their quiet arrival, however, Jaime having gone miraculously silent while taking in the menu of homely, heart-warming food, one of them addressing the proprietress as Mya and shooting her a look that Brienne instantly recognised as that of a long suffering younger sibling.

Catching the end of the glare as the petite girl turned to smile up at them, newly introduced as Bella, they were directed to a free table placed directly between the front window and fire. The surrounding youthfulness was an unwelcome reminder of who Brienne had left behind in the hospital for the evening, guilt flooding through her cold bones even as the smells floating out of the kitchen made her empty stomach growl and grumble. Jaime didn't appear to be having the same problem, though she couldn't yet read him well enough to know for sure.

"If I'm remembering correctly..." Brienne heard Jaime tell their server as she peeled off her coat, settling herself down a reasonable distance away from him and watching with some interest as he seemed to be keeping his charm in check, despite Bella practically drooling over him. Maybe if he had gone for a drink, rather than donating blood a fortnight ago, Jaime would have been better able to purge the shock from his system and she wouldn't have been thrown in at the deep end when it came to discovering the dirty secrets lurking in the Lannister family tree. But Brienne was beginning to realise that it was much too late to think like that anymore.

Rolling her eyes at the scene playing out in front of her, his pretty face a siren call to a sea of lonely circling travellers, Brienne pulled out her phone and started to text, quickly realising that she had no one who would really miss her being home late that night. She sent a quick message to Pia anyway, wishing her a safe journey and letting her know where she had ended up, just in case.

"Do you still have that spectacular blonde ale here?" Jaime was asking, reminiscing about the last time his brother had brought him to The Rose and Crown and they'd both gotten spectacularly drunk. "The Shy Maid? I'd really like to taste her again tonight."

Brienne finally lifted her head at what she thought was the end of their conversation, finding Jaime smiling and batting his eyelashes at her, while completely ignoring the poor girl who was scribbling intently on her notepad.

"And for you, miss?" Bella sounded a little concerned that she had to ask a second time, Brienne momentarily too caught up in blushing to answer as her mind raced to fill in the gaps made possible by Jaime's order and the exact curve of his mouth as he lewdly bit into his lower lip. “Miss? Can I get you a drink?"

"S-Sapphire...Label Cider. And a glass of water, please."

Bella smiled her thanks, adding a scrawl to the piece of paper. "Do you want to order your food now or should I come back in a bit? My brother's our chef, he makes the most amazing ribs but today's bacon and three bean soup is just as good."

"Is that your sister behind the bar as well?" Brienne wondered out loud after she had picked the first thing from the menu that piqued her interest, and growing appetite. Jaime, unsurprisingly, had known exactly what he wanted without the need for any persuasion from Bella. "I didn't know this was a family run place."

"Yeah, for the last couple of years it's been the four of us. You'll probably see Edric at some point, too, though if Mya spots him, there'll be trouble. Mid-terms." Bella frowned, checking their order again as if it had changed in the thirty seconds she had been talking to Brienne. "Did you not know? We don't get many couples in here on a Friday night without a reservation, especially in the winter."

"We're not-" Brienne began, trailing off as Jaime started to slide along the bench towards her, his hand coming down to rest alongside hers, skin deliberately grazing against skin. "We're just here for a drink and something to eat and then we need to get back on the road."

"Well, I wouldn't advise going out there again tonight, but Seven knows, it might ease off after you've eaten."

It didn't. If anything, it got worse.

As they waited for their food, Brienne kept one eye on what was happening outside, wondering, if they were still stuck out there, if it would seem half as idyllic as it did from behind the safety of frosted glass, methodically working her way through the bread basket as Jaime watched from behind his own glass a little too closely for comfort. She wanted to ask him what was so fascinating, but, before she could follow that train of thought to an almost inevitable conclusion, Bella arrived with two steaming bowls of soup and neither of them wanted to talk or tease when the food tasted even better than it had smelled.

They started up again over their next course, Jaime ordering his third pint while Brienne nursed what was left in her tall glass, eventually feeling like she was able to relax as they talked and laughed and bonded, the worries and doubts that were still present at the back of her mind loosening little by little as she shared what she could from the past few weeks. And when things slipped threateningly into deeper, darker waters, seeking out answers to questions she didn't really want details of, though feeling almost compelled to know, he answered plainly and Brienne found relief, rather than disgust, in most of his actions. It took a long while but he waited until she'd nodded, questions flooding out of her about the lives that had been saved because he'd gone against his police captain's wishes and what that had meant for his career, how had he not reported the strange behaviour earlier, why she was the only one to know the truth. But while Jaime bounced between tired, cruel jokes and sharp honesty, she already understood how it felt to watch someone die and not be able to stop it, how they had to treat killers and convicted criminals with the same level of respect that one would give an innocent child, how their view of the world might not have been too far apart after all.

She reached for his hand as he snapped one last half-hearted platitude about the nickname the media had bestowed, squeezing tightly, knowing it must have hurt to have his bright future ripped away in black and white. He brought her knuckles up to his lips, distracting her with a gallant kiss before stealing fries off her plate, going back to discussing broken promises, broken families and broken hearts. Though it wasn't love as she knew it, something resembling the well-intended emotion seemed to have guided him, and, try as she might to think otherwise, Brienne didn't doubt Jaime had done the best he could for Tommen and his siblings.

As her plate emptied, she sensed a weight start to lift off them both, Jaime having finished his steak while she'd listened and considered and accepted all she could, full of smiles and clever words as he saw an opportunity to pick at her food again. Beginning to build an unstable wall of condiments and menus to stop his thieving fingers from succeeding, she soon discovered there was more fun to be had over dinner with Jaime, despite their vastly different upbringings and learned life lessons, than on any date she'd been on since reaching adulthood.

By the time Bella had circled back to their table with desert offerings, Jaime was pressed against Brienne's side, his free arm resting on the back of their shared bench. She hadn't looked out the window in so long that, when she was reminded to do so, the settled snow was lying half way up the wheels of her Jeep. Her next sigh was so loud that it practically echoed around the emptying room, pursing her lips as she glanced at Jaime for what felt like the longest moment of her life, flushed and content and apprehensive. "I think we're staying."

Jaime's lips deliberately grazed her ear lobe as he turned his head, the low rumble of his voice reverberating down her neck, setting her skin on fire and her pulse jumping. “I was wondering when you were going to catch up to that."

Bella positively beamed. "I think we have the perfect room for you," she told them as she cleared the table. "Can I get you anything else before you go upstairs?"

Brienne shook her head, having an underdeveloped sweet tooth that seemed to have been rectified in her sisters. Jaime, though, insisted on not only picking something that looked to be little more than cream and sugar but that Bella bring two spoons with it. Brienne knew that the gesture was stupid and romantic and everything she shouldn't be wanting from him, expecting he'd done it primarily to see what shade of scarlet she'd turn under his amorous attentions, but she took a spoonful of the concoction as soon as it arrived, just to shut him up.

Unintentionally licking her lips more than once as she swallowed, Brienne swivelled in her seat to face Jaime, the determination that had wrapped around her tongue leaving her close to speechless as his hand slipped down her back, Jaime's green eyes darkening like a never ending forest cast in twilight. "Are...are you h-happy now?" she stuttered, not alone in needing a moment to shake off whatever had just passed between them.

"Yes," he purred, taking the spoon out of her hand as if wanting to taste both her and the desert. "But you still don't know what you're missing."

"Oh, I think I do."

"Why don't you enlighten me then, Doc?" Jaime smiled languidly, his fingers gripping where they'd come to rest at her waist, Brienne instinctively moving closer until she could almost feel his lips on her skin again.

"I-I need..." _You_ , she thought, _so much_. "To go and get something from my car."

"Now?"

"I have clean clothes. In there. To sleep in."

Jaime laughed, low and rumbling, leaving the desert to melt as his fingers drew careless circles over her sweater. "I'd ask if you'd been planning this but most people don't pack pyjamas for a dirty weekend."

"One," she huffed, sliding out of reach of his gentle explorations in order to better compose herself. "I can't control the weather. I'm not a comic book character."

"Heiress, doctor, and Wonder Woman? Now that's something I'd tune in for."

She glared at him. "Two, I didn't get to go to the gym today so I have my work out clothes with me. Three, don't get any ideas, there is no way this is going to turn into a weekend, as I've got a shift in the morning. We're just going to sleep together tonight."

"Should I get the cheque, then?"

"I didn't mean what you think I meant," Brienne breathed in an exasperated whisper as he laughed again. "Most of these rooms probably have two beds in them anyway for...for bachelorette parties and things."

"Or king sized beds for horny honeymooners who can't keep their hands off each other."

Taking a breath, Brienne thought back to the times she'd been left with an uncooperative patient, dealing with her similarly stubborn sisters when they'd been younger, putting her mind to learning the art of compromise all over again. It wouldn't be easy, but at least they'd both get out of The Rose and Crown in one piece and maybe that way she would manage to take Jaime's smirk down a few watts in the process. "You can finish...drinking your cake while I get what I need out of my car. Then we can split the bill."

"I love it when you get all bossy," he replied without missing a beat, the twinkle in his eye catching the dying embers of the fire and making it look like there was wildfire caressing his pupils. "Will I get spanked later if I don't behave?"

"Shut. Your. Mouth."

"Make me." Jaime waited until she had shuffled forward again to keep their conversation as private as possible, looking for the comeback that would stop him dead in his tracks, spluttering and speechless at the cheek of him, to dip his head, a wave of honesty washing over him as he ran a hand through his hair. "In my limited experience, usually the person who did the asking pays for dinner on the first date."

Brienne found all she could do was blink, unable to keep up with the turning tides. "This wasn't...was it?"

"I've never wanted to kiss you more, if that's any indication."

"Jaime," she whispered, bumping into the side of the table as she tried to put just a little distance between him and the swiftly spreading blush that was scorching her skin. This evening had been a world away from their first, desperate, encounter and, as they stared at each other now, she couldn't help but feel pleasantly surprised over what they had already shared in the last few hours.

"Was that too much?" he grinned and Brienne's blush deepened, turning from scarlet to crimson. She took a breath, wondering if this was what it was like to fall absolutely, fearlessly, for someone she was only now getting to know, after months of watching from the side lines, his interruption coming before she had to chance to process her reply. "It's okay, I just wanted you to know."

"I'll-I'll be back in a minute," she promised as she stood, doing her best to hide her face from the rest of the room.

"And you know where I'll be."


	9. Chapter Nine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "If I didn't know better, I'd wonder if you've been planning this," she grumbled, pulling away as Jaime tried to burrow under layers of clothing to rub over slivers of exposed skin. "But I doubt anyone would be so stupid to wait outside in the rain just in case one person happened to drive past. Things like that only happen in movies where people don't have to worry about any number of reasons for long hospital stays."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you again for all of your support!
> 
> Though this chapter may focus on more bonding, I can promise there are certain, ahem, developments between these two next chapter. If anyone is interested in that ;)

By the time she'd returned from her car, Brienne found Jaime had moved to stand in front of the unmanned welcome desk, the black and gold credit card in his hand catching the light each time he turned it like a street magician between his fingers.

"She's just gone to get us some toothbrushes and things," he explained, pocketing the card before reaching out to help brush the last drops of snowmelt off her shoulders and out of her hair. "Something about wanting to make our stay as comfortable as possible. I think she must like us, Doc."

"More likely she's guessed the limit on that card and the wealth of generosity you might extend if you enjoy your stay."

Jaime laughed. "I'm not saying you're wrong but allow me my fantasy just a moment longer." At that, he stopped stroking her shoulders and moved his hands down her back, taking a step forward to begin unbuttoning her coat almost quicker than Brienne could process.

"If I didn't know better, I'd wonder if you've been planning this," she grumbled, pulling away as Jaime tried to burrow under layers of clothing to rub over slivers of exposed skin. "But I doubt anyone would be so stupid to wait outside in the rain just in case one person happened to drive past. Things like that only happen in movies where people don't have to worry about any number of reasons for long hospital stays. And just so you don't get any more ideas, I would have preferred to share the cost of staying."

"Your sisters really need to get you to watch more movies. There must be ones where the hard working heroine gets her guy and they enjoy some much needed alone time, strictly PG-13, of course, until they get little older," Jaime murmured, making her absently wonder if running her fingers through his hair would be considered making a _move_ as they stood mere inches away from each other. She remember how his increasingly lingering kisses had tingled, wanting more and more to spend the night wrapped up in him despite the self-conscious concern that kept her from saying so.

But then, she heard someone purposely clear their throat from behind them. Her blush roared back to life in the second or two it took for her to realise where the sound was coming from, swallowing hard as she inelegantly wriggled away from him.

"I'm so very sorry," she repeated, feeling Jaime catch her hand, keeping her from moving too far away as he pressed himself firmly against her back, cursing her bad luck at almost being caught acting like a pair of hormonal teenagers. Again. "My...Jaime gets carried away sometimes." _Was he really hers now they'd started to bare their souls?_

"Don't worry, I've seen far worse," Mya, the brunette who had been behind the bar earlier, replied, barely able to keep from staring at Jaime. "The newlyweds we get in here aren't usually fans of discretion. Something about this place must make them think they're behind closed doors. Believe me, you were fine."

"It'll not happen again," Brienne promised through gritted teeth. Jaime's head rose to rest lovingly familiar on her shoulder, politely taking the room keys and bag of toiletries from the obliging manager before he could think about encouraging the heat back along her long, arching, neck. She could feel his breath caressing her skin, a steady rhythm with only the slightest hitch when she cocked her head to take a better look at him or nervously rocked up onto the balls of her feet. There was nothing in her arsenal of experiences that had prepared her for this kind of knee weakening adoration, his amorously tactile advances a world away from desperate misplaced desire. "We've got a room for...um...for these things."

Mya looked like she was fighting the urge to giggle, but managed to cover the need with a strained veil of professionalism. "In case you didn't see, breakfast is served between seven-thirty and ten, but we can bring it up to you if you're," her eyes shifted to Jaime again as he whispered a few ways in which they could put the room to good use. "Otherwise engaged."

"T-thank you," Brienne stuttered, unable to do much more than study the swirling patterns on the carpet while Jaime did his best to provoke a stronger reaction from her, his whole body shaking from silent laughter as she squeaked out an exhale of embarrassment. "We should be ready to check out not long after that."

"You might want to check the weather forecast before you make that decision," Mya warned pleasantly. "And if there's anything else we can help you with, just call reception. We'll be around until midnight. I do hope you enjoy your time here, Mr. and Mrs. Lannister."

"Oh, we will," Jaime rumbled, failing to cover his continued amusement by placing a feather light kiss to the side of Brienne's jaw, her mouth falling open before she could correct the assumption. "Now, where were we?"

"Your room is on the second floor, Mr. Lannister. The stairs and elevators are behind you."

Brienne thanked the proprietress again, waiting until Mya had dropped out of earshot and the door to the bar had bounced to a close before turning to hiss at Jaime. "I don't know what you told her but I'm not-"

"I didn't say a thing," he promised with a shit eating grin, arms and hands not moving from where they were comfortably wrapped. "I told you she liked us."

"I think," she sighed as he gradually moved close enough to nuzzle into the curve of her neck, slowly realising that although Jaime carried both a famous name and a gorgeously memorable face, she was an unknown quantity here and could enjoy every minute with him, if that was what she truly wanted. "She'd like us more if we went upstairs."

"Going to bed sounds like an excellent idea right about now," Jaime mock yawned, though the predatory glimmer in his eyes remained. "It's been a long day, Doc."

It had been a long couple of weeks, Brienne thought, but didn't feel the need to remind or correct him. The accidents that had brought them crashing together still weighed heavy on her mind but Tommen and Alys were finally safe and healing, being carefully watched over, and maybe she _could_ let go of that guilt for a little while. So instead of worrying too much, she allowed herself to get caught up in the thrill of following Jaime up the thickly carpeted stairs. Her training took over yet again, though, as he almost stumbled glancing at her over his shoulder and she snapped something about the adverse effects of alcohol and concussions just as his head grazed the low hanging ceiling and she ducked.

Reaching the top of the stairs, Jaime bit into his returning smile while she surveyed the room numbering directions, calling after her as she headed down the romantically decorated right hand side corridor. "I'm not sure if you like it, but I could _talk_ again," he began casually, the promise of more hanging on each syllable. "About your arse. Or your eyes."

"Shut up," she snapped. "Can't you see people are trying to rest?" She had only passed half a dozen rooms but a couple had already asked not to be disturbed, the low rumblings of late night television hosts, bouncing bed springs and mutually impassioned voices just audible.

"Rest?" Jaime laughed under his breath as he caught up with her, sliding an arm around her torso as she turned the satisfyingly heavy key in the lock. The last few conferences she'd been sent on from the hospital had taken place inside inner city hotels, key cards the rule rather than an exception, and there was something breathtakingly ordinary about having a key, almost as if they were going home together rather than spending the night in a quaint bed and breakfast. "It doesn't sound like anyone up here has taken an early night to sleep."

"Jaime."

"Open the door, Brienne."

She grumbled half-heartedly about manners and impatience as he rubbed his jaw against her cheek, being reminded of every childhood kitten who had liked to scent mark her the same way, wondering if was Jaime claiming her in return.

Her first thought was that they had been given the wrong set of keys, the room stretching out in front of her immediately feeling warm and cosy, almost as if they'd visited before and that was why it already seemed like a home away from home. Maybe that was part of the charm and the place survived on word of mouth reviews and repeat customers. There was a fire just starting to spark and crackle in the open hearth, the bed taking pride of place clearly big enough for them to share without many complaints, a neat dining set tucked away in a corner. Jaime's smile by her ear was nearly audible.

"Are you sure this hasn't been set up for someone else?"

He took the keys out of her hand and stepped away to double check the number on the door. "We're in the right place, Doc, for as long as we need it. Room 6."

She sighed, already out of her depth with the levels of romance on offer. Starting to hug herself until she found easier ground to scale, Brienne stepped further into the room and scanned the space again as Jaime closed the door to the rest of the world, catching sight of a bottle standing in a silver ice bucket, the sign propped up in front of it congratulating them on their recent vows. "That's definitely not for us."

"I think it is," Jaime replied, leaving her to work through her thoughts while he pulled out a chair and settled with his feet up. "Do married people have a certain look about them?"

Brienne shook her head. "The last time I drank champagne was at my dad's tenth wedding anniversary."

"And?"

"There may have been an incident with me trying to adopt a peacock."

He chuckled. "It seems we do have more in common than I thought. The last time I had it was at my brother's doomed engagement party. He ran off with the entertainment, I drank into the small hours. Even so, it seems a shame to waste it all."

She wasn't sure whether to laugh or not, slowly learning his reactions but still not quite able to read every raised eyebrow and teasing smirk. "We really should return it. They could give it to an actual married couple. What do we have to celebrate?"

"Being here? Being together?" he suggested with a shrug, lifting his feet and pushing out a chair. "I'll pay for it, if you want. Hells, you can pay for it with your heiress millions. Just...live a little, Doc. If only for one night."

She glanced at the bed practically calling her to rest, the fire, Jaime and the tiny square table so like the one she had in her kitchen. "One glass. We can toast to the children being on the mend. Then...then we can go to bed?"

"Sounds perfect."

"I didn't mean it like that." Brienne sat down across from him and had barely taken more than a couple of mouthfuls before he started talking again, sharing stories about his childhood, his family, his job, pausing only long enough between tales to allow her to fill in any gaps with anecdotes from her own life. It wasn't long until one glass turned into more, the bubbles making her prone to fits of girlish giggles while Jaime lost what little filter he had, words flowing out of him like he needed her to _know_ everything.

She nodded as he referred to his brother as his best friend, though, if what he had told her before hadn't been grossly exaggerated, they were different enough to not see eye to eye even more regularly than usual siblings. Putting down her glass, Brienne held his gaze as she untangled the story of her late brother and how she missed him every day although, as adults, they didn't stay in touch all that well. From there, Jaime moved onto the people he had loved and lost, the affair with his cousin reiterated as a chapter in a book already closed, Brienne's non-existent love life feeling almost conventional by the time he finished. She appreciated how much respect he had for his never ending cycle of police partners, the latest one fresh out of the police academy, hearing him refer to Peck the same way she called out her group of final year med students. It all just added to the strange camaraderie they had discovered downstairs. And after bouncing off each other with such ease, Brienne found she couldn't tell how many hours had passed when she finally tested her weight on unsurprisingly wobbly legs. The fire had died some time ago and the champagne headache had just started to prickle behind her eyes.

"Bedtime?" she asked softly, Jaime finally leaving his seat and watching her sway slightly with barely contained amusement.

"You did warn me in advance, Doc, but for such a big woman, that didn't take as long as I thought."

"I'm not drunk," she protested. "I'm _Brienne_. You're drunk." She had just enough sensible control left to glare at his smile, holding onto the table as she reached down to retrieve a lovingly worn t-shirt from her gym bag, throwing the rest of the contents at him before disappearing into the adjoining bathroom to change. The tiredness hit Brienne suddenly, as it had done in the past, once her tolerance had been surpassed, peeling off her clothes as she yawned and curled her cold toes in the fluffy pile of the bath mat.

"What are you-?" she spluttered to a halt as she opened the door, leaning against the frame while Jaime turned, having just finished turning down the bedclothes into a more comfortable rearrangement, her sweat pants lying low on his lips, looking like half a god in the dim light.

"I'm agreeing that it's time for bed, Doc," he opened his arms and shook his head as she shuffled past him and dove under the covers, her words lost as she fought for a witty reply but Jaime was at her back already, shushing whatever nonsense she wanted to share. "But since you're past the point of enjoying anything we might want to do, go to sleep."

"Don't tell me..." She trailed off, yawning again as he snuggled closer, and Brienne vaguely remembered that neither of her ex-boyfriends had stayed the night just to hold her, gratefully falling into dreams of rainbow coloured scrubs and Jaime trailing her every step at morning rounds, her lab coat strewn possessively over his street clothes.


	10. Chapter Ten

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Reluctantly, Brienne answered the call of consciousness, wriggling deeper into the warmth as she felt her eyelids fight to flutter open. The last touches of sleep clung to each of her lashes like the overhanging icicles that would have formed overnight, dragging them back down, wanting a little more time to drown in her favourite dream. _Jaime_ , she sighed inwardly, almost able to feel the weight of his body pressed against hers. Though, as she tried to turn, an attention seeking ray of sunlight fell across her face, leaving her with little choice but to greet the new day.
> 
> And there he was.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this is a little late this week, but I hope it'll be worth the wait. 
> 
> I think plot has probably taken a back seat here, but it should be back soon.
> 
> Thank you to RoseHeart for reining me in here and thank you to everyone who's reading, kudosing and commenting! I hope you enjoy! :)

Reluctantly, Brienne answered the call of consciousness, wriggling deeper into the warmth as she felt her eyelids fight to flutter open. The last touches of sleep clung to each of her lashes like the overhanging icicles that would have formed overnight, dragging them back down, wanting a little more time to drown in her favourite dream. _Jaime_ , she sighed inwardly, almost able to feel the weight of his body pressed against hers. Though, as she tried to turn, an attention seeking ray of sunlight fell across her face, leaving her with little choice but to greet the new day.

And there he was.

His head was resting on her shoulder, Jaime snoring softly with a hand splayed over her hip, looking far too good to be true. She blinked as her breath played with his hair, golden strands rising and falling as she started to build up the courage needed to wake him and shatter the illusion of mutual affection.

"Jaime," she murmured, her head as clear as it had been when she'd offered him a ride home, running her hand down his side in an attempt to lift his sleeping weight off her. It only succeeded in his palm pressing firmer into the curve of her hip, however, his fingers trailing along the edges of her sensible underwear, his lips coming in contact with her neck. She held back a shiver as he quickly kissed her a second time, feeling his smile burst into life despite still being more than half asleep.

"Jaime." That time it sounded more like a moan than a murmur, focusing less on the enjoyment of how close he seemed to be and more on the fact that when he was sober, emotionally stable and fully conscious, and that he couldn't possibly want somebody like her. Though in the second it took her to work that thought through to its bitter end, mentally preparing herself for the moment when he realised who was lying at his side, Jaime began to suckle at her flushed skin, gently encouraging her to reciprocate his concerted efforts, pulling them both into wakefulness with his mouth and hands running all over her.

Unfurling under the onslaught, Brienne found herself reaching up to clutch at his head, listening to him mumble something that could have been her name as she arched her back, the last drops of fatigue in her system playing with her inhibitions. Tugging at the hem of her shirt while she slowly learned the tantalisingly rhythmic rocking of his hips, Jaime rubbed his nose back up her neck to rumble a greeting in her ear.

"What's up, Doc?"

She barked out a laugh as rough as sandpaper, the effects of their numerous after dinner drinks grating all the way down her raw throat, feeling him frown before his lips were straying to the origin point of the sound. Vowing to never again test her poorly developed alcohol tolerance against his innate Lannister handling skills, she twisted in his arms, wrapping herself up tighter in the fake fur, making him return the laugh.

"Good morning," she rasped, freeing her limbs from under the restrictive bedclothes, Jaime lifting his head only high enough to claim her mouth. Before she had a chance to remember to hold back, Brienne eagerly responded to the enthusiastic, searching quality of his kiss, opening herself up to the possibility of doing more without worry, without fear, without despair eating away at her.

"The best," he agreed as they parted, his palms making their way under her shirt, gazing up at her in such awestruck wonder, as if he was both surprised and overjoyed she had stayed the night. Brienne had to focus on anything but the depth of feeling his eyes, lest the rising blush overwhelm her cheeks. Forgoing tracing the slight curve of her waist and the sculpted tone of her stomach, Jaime raised a hand to her face, cupping her jaw as he rubbed his thumb through a field of fiery freckles, his voice dropping to murmurs again, though she clearly heard the words 'in love' and 'cheeks.'

"Jaime," she began, his smile momentarily blinding. "I...I have work. We should...think about..."

"It's still snowing." She pulled a face and he shifted under her, dressed only in the sweat pants she'd had in her unused gym bag, the material warm between her thighs as it lay low on his hips, acres of perfectly chiselled, perfectly tanned flesh tempting her to touch. "We should think about getting comfortable, Doc, we might be here a while longer."

"I should call, then," she decided firmly. "They'll need to find someone to cover my shift."

Jaime grinned languidly. "You could. Or you could stay exactly where you are and let me look at you."

Brienne turned her head to glare at the thick, chintzy curtains, his current mood too much of a conundrum to focus on for more than a few moments, wondering if the snow had stopped at any point during the long night. "You've seen me. In the parking lot. In the hospital. In the blood..." She swallowed another emotion that seemed to have no place in their current setting. "I haven't changed."

"But I haven't seen you like this," he countered carefully, making a point of audibly exhaling and relaxing deeper into the feather filled pillow, picking up the same rocking motion as earlier so that there was no doubt to how much of an effect her presence was having. "Half dressed, half asleep and still too early for you to have built all your walls back up. It's like a dream come true."

"You're kidding," she huffed. To think of him lying by her side, wrapped around her for hours in a pretence of needing to keep warm, was almost too much to process without giving into the ache building between her legs.

"I think, Doc, we both know I'm not the type to lie to get a woman into bed."

"I'm already in your bed," she spat out, blushing as soon as the words left her mouth.

"I know." Watching her study him, his smile quickly faltered as they both realised the slight movement of her arms crossing over her chest had managed to upset their delicate balance, Brienne reaching out to grip the side of the bed before she fell, Jaime's strong, sharp reflexes allowing him to catch and hold her steady. "And if you didn't want to be here right now," he purred, nose to nose, bodies pressed tight, failing to stop herself smiling at the tingle his increasingly shallow breaths made against her lips, warm and tempting and suggestive. Signalling her intentions with a touch as soft as a falling snowflake, chaste and careful, she attempted to hold back the flood of want a moment longer. "I know you'd already be digging your car out of the snow."

"Maybe..."

He shook his head, allowing their lips to meet softly for another skipping beat as if knowingly testing the very last shreds of her resolve. "They'll still be asleep. It's just you and me, and I can promise there's no one out there who wants to spend time with you as much as I do."

An immediate protest tickled the tip of her tongue, though, as she held his gaze she couldn't find a tangible reason to grant the concern life. It was strange to consider that she'd never done this before, experienced the simplicity of spending time with a man who had so far shown he cared about and desired her far more than during either of her two short lived relationships. There was nobody coming to knock on the door, no call button about to go off, no life or death moment approaching that she could prevent. "I don't...want to leave, I-I want you."

"Tell me again. Please."

"Jaime," she gasped, biting her tongue as an involuntary thrust became a slow grind she couldn't help but copy, ducking her head to groan as he nuzzled along her cheek. "I want...more."

"Seven hells," he swore, his lips hovering by her ear, his murmurs low and rough and brimming with the power to leave her speechless. "Gods, yes. I want to see how wide your eyes go when you fall apart in my arms."

Brienne felt her body respond as the humming words vibrated against her skin, adding to the delicious, desperate tingles that had taken up residence in each of her tensing muscles. Her head spun as his fingers teased back around her rib cage and up towards softer swells of flesh, encouraging waves of sensation through her so intensely, she couldn't hold back the wanton moan that was only muffled by Jaime's insistent mouth. At the sound, he made a noise that was part way between a laugh and a groan of his own, tightening his grip as her knees, the only thing holding the rest of her weight off him, threatened to give out. And just as she was getting used to the feel of him moving against her again, Jaime took charge in changing the flavours of lust they were touching upon, slowing each kiss until she could almost breathe easy, enjoying each second of pause and press and parry.

"I was going to ask if you were having fun yet," he laughed, rolling her over so she was sandwiched between him and the mattress. Brienne shivered at the change in temperature, feeling Jaime settle and swell harder against her. The haze of longing between them lay heavy in the air, even more intoxicating than what had almost come to pass in the blood bank, her burgeoning desire for more causing her to clumsily catch his lip with her teeth. "But I think...gods, Doc, do that again, I've just got my answer."

"Is this okay?" she breathed, hearing her own name echo back as she nibbled along the kiss swollen surface, ignoring the waxing and waning tide of embarrassment that coloured her cheeks and made her fingers fumble as they skimmed and stroked over the dark golden hair that decorated the plains of his chest. A strange spike of arousal pooled in her stomach as she brushed over his nipple and he closed his eyes in unadulterated bliss, moaning too long and too loud, both of them enjoying Brienne's stutteringly inexperienced attempts at foreplay.

"It's good. You're good," he purred, skimming a sensitive spot on the underside of her breast that made her eyelashes flutter. "I'm in excellent hands. But I want to touch you, too."

"You are touching me," she replied slowly, syllables stretching as lips and hips and fingertips continued to move, to explore, to learn. There was going to be a love bite under her jaw where she wouldn't be able to hide his attentions tomorrow, the bruise already starting to bloom, but she couldn't stay away from his mouth, meeting each thrilling kiss with undeniable fierceness of want.

Though even the hint of disbelief in her tone caused Jaime to raise himself further up on his elbows and blink down at her, his hips circling once, twice, before stopping, building a fire in her that seemed to be in direct opposition to the purpose of seeking out relief. "I want to taste you."

"Oh." It was more breath than sound that escaped with the exclamation, the wildfire burning behind his lowered lashes making it even more difficult for Brienne not to disappear back into doubt and self-consciousness.

He stared for a second longer, a twitch quirking the corner of his lips into a soothing, dimpling smile, before running a finger along her collarbone, pulling at the neckline of her shirt and dipping down to kiss the newly exposed, embarrassingly strawberry, skin. "First time?"

"No. I'm not...I mean, I've had...just not that."

"I'll go slow," he promised, sliding further down her body to suckle at the tip of her near heaving breast, taking it into his mouth. Brienne let out another heavy sigh, shifting her weight to run her knee along his side, hooking it over his hip and holding him right where she wanted while Jaime teased at the slight softness, nipping with his teeth just when she started to arch her back, silently asking for more. "And just tell me to stop if it gets too much."

"Don't...stop."

She felt his laughter tickle over her stomach, the stubble on his chin adding to the pleasant prickle of sensation, tracing out the muscle definition with his tongue as if he really was trying to memorise how she tasted. Though if it was half as good as his name as it fell from her lips, his breath warm against her damp underwear, it was almost worth taking the time to tease.

As he placed a series of open mouthed kisses along the inside of her thigh, pressing a smile to the quivering, freckled flesh, Brienne thought back to what she had said in the blood bank as he'd sunk to his knees in front of her. "You don't need to do this," she reiterated. "We...can just, you can..."

"I _am_ happy here," Jaime insisted with another briefly lingering kiss between her spread legs, making sure she was still watching his every move as the bed shifted and he reached down to steady himself, squeezing and stroking through the fleecy material of her favourite sweatpants while his tongue darted out to lap between words, coming closer to where she desperately wanted him. "I didn't think you'd want to skip ahead so soon."

Her mouth suddenly dry, Brienne swallowed, her mind a mess of lacklustre past experiences and heated daydreams, the room shuddering into silence only broken by the sounds of ragged breathing. _He really wants this. He wants to please me._ Unable to dredge up a word or phrase that would successfully convey how deep the feeling was shared, she took a deep breath and lifted her hips, allowing Jaime to help strip off the drenched white cotton, leaving her naked from the waist down.

"Please, Jaime," she whispered, feeling exposed, though excitement had a part to play as well. And, just as she was losing the fight to cover herself, he bowed his head to taste.

It was unlike anything Brienne had felt before, listening to an impassioned cry leave her lips in a voice so far from her own, it took a moment for the shock to abate before recognising the exact note of pleasure. While she'd grown used to the exact pressure and texture of her fingers between her legs, Jaime's lips were wonderfully warm, his tongue soft and slick and swirling, and it was clear he knew enough to work out what would make her hips buck for more, her deepening infatuation turn to liquid lust, her legs weaken at the vibration of his delighted murmuring. Closing her eyes as the first, familiar signs of climax began to creep up her legs and down her spine, heartbeat pounding, Brienne wasn't prepared to think about anything but giving herself over to the slow unravelling Jaime's fervent mouth at her centre was producing.

Yet, it had been easier to believe in the purity of romance the night before, when she had allowed alcohol to cloud her thoughts to the contrary, letting herself think that one day, maybe, she wouldn't be alone with her feelings.

"Brienne," he called out as she started to fall back into doubt and mistrust, his hands soothing where she must have tensed, expecting the high of orgasm to follow but reacting to the worries she was offering herself instead. "Look at me. If it's not feeling good, tell me, no, _show_ me what you like."

"It's good," she panted, already lamenting the loss of his lips, surprised to discover how easy it was to rest her thigh on his shoulder, watching his eyes turn as dark as a forest cast under a midnight moon, his chin glistening and hair mussed from her gripping fingers. She didn't know what else he wanted her to say but Jaime purred happily as she moved her fingers through his golden waves, stomach knotting and hips rolling when he moaned at her sudden haste to guide his actions. Instinctively she whispered an apology that was cut off by the fluttering of a kiss along her palm, the touch becoming almost painfully tender, his gaze never leaving her face. Then, he dipped back down to flick his tongue against her, feeling all the pent up need rushing back to meet him, so close now to the edge. "Really good...gods, right there... _Jaime_."

For a few moments, it felt like she was floating in a sea of pure satisfaction, the high as pronounced as any she'd helped herself to, and even more gratifying to share it with him, breaking apart and falling back together just as Jaime stretched out beside her. He pulled the blankets up over them while she wrapped him in her arms, needing the closeness as her muscles worked through the trembling after effects.

"Hey," Jaime breathed as she opened her eyes and moved to kiss him without doubting her physical shortcomings or his intentions, sounding and feeling like he'd been deeply affected by what had just happened between them. He pressed hard into her thigh while they zealously made out like he hadn't just made her see stars. "Now that I know how easy it is to make you do that, I'm never going to get tired of watching you come and wanting to cuddle afterwards."

 _Never?_ Brienne wondered, tasting herself on his tongue as they continued to trade increasingly confident touches, picking up where they had left off in reading and responding to each other's reactions. Again, she was struck by the novelty of having this man, this beautiful, tactile, spontaneous man, who was currently being very vocal about how good her hands felt squeezing his ass, appear to be interested in not only the here and now but possibly more. And, as she started thinking about the building intimacy that was equal part fear and thrill, Jaime pulled away to murmur some delicious nonsense about the colour her skin was turning, shutting him up all too easily with her teeth at his lip and her palm sliding the sweatpants further down his hips.

He found her lips again as her hand firmly, gently, awkwardly, closed around his arousal, hard under velvety soft skin, letting him guide her towards faster movements until Jaime's loud burst of encouragement reverberated around the room in the same second the sound of the housekeeping trolley pushed past their door.

"Gods," she swore, dropping his cock and hiding her flushing face in his neck. "What if they...?"

"That's what 'do not disturb' signs are for. I put it on after you fell asleep last night. I thought you...we might want to be left alone."

"At work last week," she began, confusion tensing across his shoulders, the change in subject not quite welcome yet when they could be doing more interesting things. "At work, I drew the short straw with the community health seminar. It was a nightmare."

"Okay, I'm not sure what..."

"It was a safe sex seminar." He raised an eyebrow and she sighed at needing to spell it out. "What I mean is, I still have protection in my bag."

He laughed softly, kissing her cheek. "I was getting around to asking if one of us did, don't worry. And, for the record, I would have loved to see you give that seminar."

"There were bananas."

"Well protected bananas," he corrected, untangling from her with a groan of reluctance and lifting the haphazardly piled blankets to climb out of the bed. Removing the remainder of his clothing as he stalked through the thick carpet, Jaime kept stopping and shooting her looks that sent shivers down her spine every few steps, almost as if he was checking she was still there, the touch of nervousness in direct odds with him putting on a show. Though she'd seen all of it before, her shyness still balancing out his lack thereof, the memory of his hard, naked form wrapped around her in the blood bank sent heat rushing from her extremities and it took all her self control not to check him out while he fumbled with the small foil packets zipped away in her bag.

"You're sure there's not a guy at the gym who's going to be missing these? Or you?"

"I'm positive. There hasn't been anyone for a long time." _A very long time._ "And even then, it wasn't always..."

"What?"

 _Fun? Enjoyable? Intimate?_ "Like this."

"Well, Doc, why don't you go ahead and look all you want," Jaime suggested with a deliberately lascivious smile, rolling his shoulders slightly as her eyes darted away, feeling like she'd finally said the right thing at the right time. "Because I can't get this hospital endorsed bastard open." He paused. "It's been a long time for me, too."

"Come here," she murmured, boldly reaching out for his hand. "You're absolutely gorgeous but it's a good job you're a cop as you'd be useless as a medical assistant."

"I'll show you useless," he muttered darkly as Brienne proceeded to open the silver square and pass it back, embracing whatever daring was left in her by giving him one more long, slow stroke. "Brienne," he growled, the sound of her name enough to repeat the motion until he was as damp and needy as she felt, finding the places that made his demands for her to both stop and never stop seem more like pleas for mercy. "Come on, let me back into bed before I...freeze."

"Sorry," she mumbled, moving the furs around and shuffling across the mattress a little to preserve some warmth. Jaime, though, was more interested in the heat of her skin than the space around them, slipping under the covers as she raised them, his cooling hands almost immediately burrowing under the hem of her shirt.

"Can I take this off you now?" he growled. "We'd be warmer and you're always wanting to share."

"I mentioned it once or...okay."

He was gentler than she had been expecting, though, by that point, nothing about Jaime's careful consideration should have been a surprise, making sure no sliver of skin went untouched as she clumsily removed the last of her clothing. His eyes widened into dark saucers of delight at the show of skin, whatever she was lacking of no matter when his expression was so open and desirous that she almost turned away from it.

"Jaime," she whimpered, the sensation of skin on skin keeping her in the moment. He was warmer than he'd claimed to be though she was burning up just looking at him, resting on his elbows above her and occasionally brushing hair off her forehead. The way their bodies were pressed together left no room for anything but the feel of his muscles tensing, the sound of her heart pounding, the taste of his lips. Brienne pushed a hand behind his head as he teased down the crease of her thigh, one final check that she was past the point of ready, his thumb flicking over a spot that sent her keening as his fingers thrust inside. "Jaime, I want you, please-"

Quietening them both with another deep kiss filled with longing, he eased himself inside her, Brienne beginning to understand where his pleading notes had come from as she felt them sing between sighs and feeling his tongue stroke along hers. She couldn't stop saying his name as he pulled out and pushed back in, keeping the motion slow and gentle while she adjusted to the fit, every inch of her crying out for every inch of him, tight and slick. Loosening her grip on his hair, she smoothed down Jaime's tense jaw, taking in his blown pupils and the beads of sweat glistening in the sensual hollow of his neck, knowing he was holding back for her. She had to clutch him tighter between her limbs, squeezing inside and out to ask for more, though Jaime didn't need much encouragement to pick up speed, full of promising murmurs that made her louder than ever before. His laugh was a broken croak as she screamed, staying preoccupied by her mouth and the freckles along the bridge of her nose, pulling down her hand between them while he thrusted into her, hard and fast. She only had to circle her nub a handful of times, refining the rhythm and pushing him faster still, before Jaime was groaning her name and she fell with him a few heartbeats later.

They were a mess of sweaty skin and long limbs and rumpled sheets afterwards, enjoying the bliss that seemed to accompany the feeling of being wanted exactly how and where she was, losing track of time while Jaime spooned up behind her, the continued emotional connection something new, too. Yawning, Brienne glanced back at him and smiled. "Is it still snowing?"

"I think so."

He kissed her shoulder and the last thought Brienne had before falling asleep again was that she really should call work.


	11. Chapter Eleven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The bed was empty when Brienne next opened her eyes, but the smell of pancakes and bacon made her stomach growl in appreciation as she took in the sight of Jaime, still at arm's length, wrapped in a fluffy white robe, watching the weekend sports report roll across the TV screen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who is still reading this! I'm moving onto the fluff part of my original plan, which I hope is just as enjoyable as the rest.
> 
> Thank you to RoseHeart for reading this over for me and making some great suggestions where my sentences were getting a bit too run-on :)
> 
> And I promise I will reply to all your wonderful comments in the next few days!
> 
> Thank you!

The bed was empty when Brienne next opened her eyes, but the smell of pancakes and bacon made her stomach growl in appreciation as she took in the sight of Jaime, still at arm's length, wrapped in a fluffy white robe, watching the weekend sports report roll across the TV screen. There was something about the way the room looked through the last clutches of her drowsy haze, how normal and comfortable it seemed to catch up on sleep while he occupied himself, how it could have just as easily been a morning following a hard night shift, and she had to blink a couple of times to make sure she wasn't still dreaming.

"What time is it?" she asked huskily, going to stretch before remembering she was still naked under the covers.

"A little after nine," he replied with a smile, looking away from the ticker tape listing events postponed by the snow. "I thought you might sleep away the whole morning."

Not so long ago, Brienne would have agreed that the luxury of a whole morning spent in bed was a fantasy she had occasionally indulged in during the last hour of her much too long training days, but, after last night, her plans for that much time in the company of her duvet were a little less solitary. "You ordered breakfast?"

"You sound surprised." He shrugged, nonchalant as he muted the TV. "We worked up an appetite and I figured, who doesn't like pancakes?"

"With bacon."

"And syrup. The breakfast menu is as good as the one they had for dinner."

It didn't seem like he was going out of his way to impress her, but breakfast in bed was certainly a nice touch, and one Brienne appreciated, as she wasn't sure she could have handled the walk of shame associated with going downstairs in yesterday's clothes.

"There's another robe in the bathroom," Jaime told her as she tried to surreptitiously search the room for her shirt, glancing back to the screen when she heard an announcer state that the Lannister funding was causing more trouble at The Lions. "Gods, I can't escape them even here," he muttered, swearing once before firmly turning off the television. "You hungry?"

She opened her mouth but her stomach answered him instead, grumbling that she wasn't already two pancakes into the stack. "Would you mind turning around when I..."

Following a long moment of hesitation where he looked her up and down, Brienne feeling like he already knew every line and barely noticeable curve on her body and was merely reminding himself of the places where she was most sensitive, Jaime did as he was asked. "It's not like I haven't seen all of you before," he drawled while she pulled at the sheets and scurried across the floor to the safety of the bathroom. "You've got a line of freckles on your left thigh that look like a shooting star. And they taste like they're from the heavens themselves."

Blushing furiously from behind the closing door, she hissed his name in embarrassed outrage, reaching for the light while he laughed, carefree and utterly elated. Smiling despite herself, Brienne ran her fingers through her hair, tucking it behind her ears as she caught sight of her dishevelled reflection in the mirror, dozens of marks from his exuberant mouth and beard standing out like beacons of lust against her pale skin. Gently, she pressed a fingertip to the brightest bruise on her neck, sighing as she stroked the matching love bite along her collarbone. Everyone was going to know that she was _involved_ with someone and somehow Brienne couldn't bring herself to want to cover them up.

Hearing him shuffling around as she finished taking care of a most pressing need, Brienne dried her hands and slipped the robe around her shoulders, the material caressing her bare skin as soft as cashmere, a pair of slippers left out for her feeling just as warm and luxurious. She thought she should at least splash some water on her face, especially if she wouldn't be showering until later, but Jaime's soft knock stopped her.

"Come out, come out, however you are. The bacon is getting cold," he paused. "You weren't this shy when you were screaming my name a couple of hours ago, Brienne."

"That's not normally like me."

"If you say so. For the record, I really liked you being so vocal. It was fucking hot. I wouldn't mind if you wanted to try the same thing next time."

"Next time?" she asked, dropping a to his cheek as she passed on the way to the table, breathing in the sweet, salty tang of their breakfast. "If you want to do any of _that_ again, I-I think we need to eat first."

It felt like Jaime was by her side in the blink of an eye, returning the gently given, well meaning touch as his lips briefly traversed the line of her jaw, still enjoying the intermittent press of her body against his as they sat down. Brienne took the chance to pile her plate with layers of pancake, bacon, and syrup. He watched as she wolfed down one without pausing to breathe, laughing through whatever touch of awkwardness remained while stealing food from under her nose, just like at dinner. "It's a good job I ordered two stacks of pancakes, Doc."

"Greedy," she murmured, not knowing if it was in reference to his increasingly attention seeking stomach or his appetite for other things that would involve her shedding the tightly belted robe and heading back to bed. Despite her earlier eagerness, and how good Jaime had felt beside her, on top of her, inside her, there was still a part of her that couldn't stop wondering if this encounter could be considered a mistake, the tangled web of his past added to her own bad habits of self-doubt and isolation slowing her descent into foolishness.

"Oh, definitely," he agreed, pulling his chair around so that he could alternate between taking bites of the thickest, fluffiest pancakes Brienne had ever tasted and kissing down her throat, syrup staining her skin for the briefest of seconds before he lapped it up. "I've spent months trying to ignore this blue eyed Amazon sneaking into my dreams, tormenting me with her legs and ass and the freckles on her cheeks. And then, when I finally meet her, on one of the worst days of my life, she's working in an emergency room and is so damn honourable, I don't know why I'm so aroused."

She swallowed another mouthful, hard, and dropped her fork with a clatter of surprise. "I'm sorry? I know we've been crossing paths a few times a week for a while now, but I didn't think you ever _saw_ me until a fortnight ago. _Months_ , Jaime?"

"Thinking, dreaming, fantasising," he winked, smiling around a crisp slice of bacon as she blushed, wondering if he could sense her similar feelings on the subject. It _had_ been months. She'd been on an psychiatry rotation back in the spring when she had started taking the girls to school, time spent with office hours and comfortable furniture, and looking at him the first time, every time, was like staring into the sun. "You're unforgettable, Doc."

"So are you," she filled her plate as she spoke, purposely refusing to look at him until she finished. "Your hair and those shoulders and the way you adore that...your little boy. Don't get me wrong, I still think you're an arsehole when it suits you but I'd like to continue what we started last night. Getting to know each other. Secrets and all."

"You already know about my step sister and why I was suspended from duty, the real reason not what the media would have you believe. All my terrible secrets are out in the open. There's nothing left to trust you with." He poured her a second cup of coffee before helping himself to a refill. "So that only leaves the good things. Like coffee and my favourite movies."

She kept her eyes on her plate. "I should let work know I'm not going to make it in today. And shower."

"We could shower together."

"Or separately." Brienne pulled a face as she looked across at him, dubious that they would both fit in there. "Do you want the last pancake?"

"We should think about taking the kids out for brunch as soon as the only reason I have to enter the hospital is to see you," he grinned, mopping up the river of syrup spreading out in front of him. "You've got to have the occasional weekend off, right?"

"You may have to wait a while for that," she snorted. "Residency doesn't exactly work like you think it might. The best w-we probably can hope for is that my ridiculously long shifts coincide with yours."

"I can wait. But if I have to, I want to make the most of today." His voice had dropped to a barely audible growl and she had to lean in to make sense of the words, wanting so much to do more than tangle her fingers around his.

"Make your calls, Doc, take a shower, think through whatever you need to in order to understand that I want you back in bed."

So, initiating a kiss that had him moaning and biting at her lips, a hand wrapping around the nape of her neck so that she ended up sitting comfortably in his lap, she did exactly that. And if Brienne felt guilty about calling to speak to her supervisor for the first time since her medical career had begun, she was quickly reminded of the two days she'd spent running between patients and the bathroom with food poisoning. She hadn't touched Margaery's cooking since but the eight to ten inches of snowfall that had covered the city overnight, with more on the way, was a valid enough excuse to give her another day alone with Jaime and off from work.

Her next, and last, call was to the children's ward nurse’s station, making sure Alys knew why her big sister wouldn't be visiting that day and that absence didn't mean she was being abandoned. Alys remained unfazed and Brienne spent a few minutes listening to the little girl chatter excitedly about the snow, leaving her to colouring books and cartoons, with the promise that they would build a snowman soon. It wasn't possible to patch the phone through to the ICU, but she asked for Jaime's love to be passed onto Tommen nevertheless, hoping his mother or sister made it in later that afternoon. Though, after they had rolled around in the bed for a second time, Brienne growing bolder with each touch, riding him hard until he exploded beneath her and she collapsed onto his chest, Jaime called back and persuaded one of the nurses to put him on speaker.

She slipped into the shower while he spoke to his son, not wanting to intrude and still unable to deal with being seen naked under the unforgiving lights, returning to Jaime's side to discuss ordering lunch. They talked away half the afternoon over delicious sandwiches and a silly superhero blockbuster neither of them had found time to see when it was released, Brienne coming to accept that she could enjoy doing just this on a regular basis, simply relaxing and spending time with someone she got on with and related to. And by the time Jaime was suggesting putting on the sequel, she was right behind him in being ready for another round, finding hot and intimate connection under the furs, repeating the cycle of relaxation and romance until Brienne wondered if her bed was going to feel too big when she eventually went back to it.

There was little change to the view out of their window, come the following morning, Brienne opening the curtains only far enough to survey the glistening landscape, mindful not to wake Jaime, who was still stretched out in bed as she sipped orange juice and padded around the room. If she hadn't remained unsure about the exact nature of their friendship, she might have felt like teasing him later over falling asleep before the end of the second movie. Though, as it was, Brienne mulled over the past couple of days while watching a pair of ploughs steadily increasing the drifts of untouched snow lying alongside the clearly visible main road, the dark surface in sharp contrast to the surroundings even as it was dusted with more snow. It was almost therapeutic, she decided as she stayed by the window, despite going around in circles trying to figure out why extracting herself from Jaime's arms had been such a battle, her heart sinking as he groaned her name in greeting with the realisation that it was time to leave the Rose and Crown's sanctuary. A return to reality had been beckoning since she'd made an effort to rest shortly after midnight, but she hadn't anticipated it coming with such a heavy landing.

It took a while to dig her car out of the lot, even with the help of Mya and her brothers, Jaime cracking joke after joke as they shovelled but doing nothing to fill in the silences that stretched between them without more than a glance at each other. He stayed that way throughout the journey back to the hospital, too, full of smart arse remarks as he pointed out landmarks they'd missed in the dark. Unlike the man that had been so open before, who Brienne could easily find herself slipping in to conversations with, this was just a wall of snark, saying really nothing and giving her no room to find the cracks. She hadn't expected things to burn out so quickly, feeling awkward locked in the small space with not even an argument to keep them both occupied, the potential for mistakes keeping her suspended in a strange kind of limbo.

As they pulled in to the hospital and separately exited the car, she wondered if they were truly nothing more than stolen, sensual moments. Maybe they didn't need anything else now, she thought, finding their walk of shame difficult to process as Jaime edged towards proud, tactile acceptance, the pressure of his hand on the small of her back squaring her shoulders and straightening her spine.

"So..." she started again as they waited by the bank of elevators at the main entrance, wrinkling her nose at the clean, clinical smell drifting out of the emergency room that she'd just about managed to forget, pressing the button again in quick succession instead of coming up with a continuation.

"So," Jaime replied, suddenly very close, holding rather than touching. She heard people exiting from one of the cars behind them, a hurried glance over her shoulder moving from a group of smiling nurses and onto Dr Hunt's smirking, though interested face, furrowing her brow as the novel concept of jealousy danced before her. "Do you want to make out in the elevator?"

"What?"

"You and me, Doc, in the elevator," he laughed at her whispered growl, the twinkle in his eyes hard to miss, catching her off guard again as the elevator binged. "Are you telling me television has it all wrong about the medical profession?"

"What kind of shows have you been watching?"

He laughed again, weaving around the exodus of patients and visitors on his way into the empty elevator. "Bad ones, apparently."

"I can give you some recommendations."

"I can come and watch them with you."

"And spend the night because we both fall asleep on my sofa? No, Jaime, you have kids to look after. I shouldn't, I _can't_ , intrude on that again."

"You wouldn't be," he insisted, sounding far more vulnerable than she thought he had the capacity to be, casting his glance from her face to the illuminated numbers ticking above their heads while she was forced to work through yet another change of pace. "To tell you the truth, I'm not sure how much longer I'm going to have them around. Cersei, she's-," he ran a hand through his hair and her own twitched in response, torn between offering comfort and staying in the role the hospital had carved out for her; detached, unwanted, alone. "Let's just say she's going to make things very difficult if she decides to stay for any length of time."

"And if she doesn't?"

"Her precious baby has been maimed," he drawled, each syllable heavy with dripping with slow moving sarcasm. "She'll stick around until it's at least out of the papers. But whatever happens, I don't want you to think I'm not interested in seeing you again."

_Seven...eight...nine..._ , the levels rose and rose, like her beating heart. "I just thought you might..."

"I might what, Doc?"

"You were so quiet, I..." she trailed off as the elevator glided to a perfectly timed halt, leaving them frozen for an indefinite moment, caught waiting for the influx of intruders. "Never mind."

"For someone who stayed in school for so long, you can be so ignorant sometimes," Jaime muttered, her protests dying as the doors opened and Pia grinned back from the other side with a small red haired child in a wheelchair. "Come on then," he whispered, playing at being oblivious to her colleagues inquisitive look. "You don't have all day to stare at me or we'd still be at The Rose and Crown."

"Keep your voice down," she hissed, closing her mouth with an audible snap as she passed Pia, avoiding the questions she knew would come later, and completing her silent promise to return Jaime to his son's side.

"Why?" he paused. "Are you ashamed to be seen with a humble detective?"

"Humble?" she snorted. "Are we talking about the same Jaime Lannister?" He raised an eyebrow and she started laughing before she could stop herself from breaking the tension that had grown between them since leaving the car. There was no shame bubbling through her veins, only concern and worry, no one needed to know that her snow day had coincided with a day in bed with one of the city's most eligible, and infamous, bachelors. "And no, that's not it at all. We just don't proclaim anything on the floor of the PICU. It's bad luck."

"That wasn't a proclamation, Doc, that was a fact," he told her as he rang the bell in front of the glass doors protecting the hospital's most at risk patients. "You like looking at me, which is perfect because I love looking at you." Jaime had regained his tempting dimpled smile but she wasn't quite comfortable enough there in the corridor to smile back. "And I'll be here every night week, at the usual time, if you want to remind yourself of anything."

"Jaime..."

"What I meant to say, _Brienne_ , is that I'd love to see you again."

"I'm sorry to disappoint," she breathed, the concept of keeping a 'safe distance' beginning to make sense again. "From tomorrow, I'm on nights for the next two weeks. I won't have enough time at the beginning of my shift to see both Alys and you."

"Ok," he agreed, not missing a beat. "What about breakfast?"

"What about it?"

"Most days I don't start work until eight. We could go any morning you want, except Thursday."

Brienne narrowed her eyes as she worked out how far through the week she could get without falling asleep before wolfing down breakfast, and how soon she would want to see him again, self-consciousness and awkwardness notwithstanding. "Wednesday? At The Bridge Cafe on Cold Bath Place?"

"It's a date." He leaned over to place a kiss on her cheek and Brienne felt her whole body tense, expecting, but not used to, the public display of affection, mumbling what was likely nonsense before turning around and heading back downstairs as fast as she could, wondering what in the name of the Seven she was getting herself involved with.


	12. Chapter Twelve

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jaime probably should have been expecting a disparity between what his imagination had told him being with Brienne would be like and the reality of the situation. But, in all honesty, especially with his lack of proper dating experience, he couldn't have predicted how happy he would feel by just seeing her waiting for him outside the too homely to be hipster cafe. There were bags under her eyes, her noble nature having clearly been tested while he was lost in turbulent dreams. Apart, from that minor detail, she was exactly how he'd left her outside the intensive care unit, pink cheeked and unable to hold his gaze for longer than a heartbeat.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry this is a little later than planned, I've had a rotten cold for nearly two weeks now and forgot to send this chapter for proofing until the weekend. A huge thank you, as always, to RoseHeart for betaing and helping me through all my doubts and concerns. 
> 
> And thank you to everyone reading! Thank you for all your support, for your comments and kudos, it's never as easy I'd like to post and your kindness and support has helped that process so much. I hope this chapter brings this story to a satisfactory conclusion :)
> 
> The lyrics to Blood Bank are at the end.
> 
> Thank you!!!!!

Jaime probably should have been expecting a disparity between what his imagination had told him being with Brienne would be like and the reality of the situation. But, in all honesty, especially with his lack of proper dating experience, he couldn't have predicted how happy he would feel by just seeing her waiting for him outside the too homely to be hipster cafe. There were bags under her eyes, her noble nature having clearly been tested while he was lost in turbulent dreams. Apart, from that minor detail, she was exactly how he'd left her outside the intensive care unit, pink cheeked and unable to hold his gaze for longer than a heartbeat. He thought he was beginning to recognise the signs of her hesitance, equal parts awkward and self protective, the physical and emotional intimacy they had shared only days ago seeming to add to the very visible concerns flickering across her freckled forehead.

As he approached, Brienne didn't move far from her chosen spot, offering up a small, rueful, smile and a wave that was designed to keep Jaime at a distance, though he would have loved to pull her into his arms again. He wanted to feel her muscles shift towards relaxation all around him, to reacquaint himself with the almost pretty shades of blue in her eyes. He didn't like thinking that he'd been here before, albeit in a different place with a different woman, but once the thought arrived, it wouldn't leave him be. He blinked along with Brienne for a moment, strangely lost for words while hoping whatever was stopping her from fully accepting him, accepting _them_ , the way he wanted in public was related to early relationship teething troubles rather than second thoughts.

"You look awful, Doc. Rough night?"

"Something like that," she rasped, picking invisible lint off the sleeve of her coat, the stale tang of antiseptic assaulting his senses in the cold, still air. "What's your excuse?"

Jaime didn't even attempt to bite his tongue, laughing loud enough for several patrons in the window of the cafe to turn and stare. "Nice of you to notice," he snorted, thoroughly amused by her inept attempt to lace venom around her concern. If he couldn't get a physical confirmation that they'd left each other wanting more after the weekend, then maybe he could rile her into a verbal slip up. "I have nightmares sometimes," he admitted, smoothly changing the conversation. "After all these years, one or two things never go away completely."

"I know," she replied, sad and quiet and wise beyond her years. "They told us on our first day that you can't expect to forget everything. I suspect the same idea goes for cops, too."

"Detective," he corrected, patting the pocket that held his badge. "But you're right. And if you know that, then you also know I still look amazingly sexy on less than four hours sleep."

"Is that where all this was heading?" Brienne rolled her eyes, the long night and his continued needling making her adorably cranky. "You slept better than okay when we were together."

"I did," Jaime agreed as he smiled at the memory of sharing a bed with her, wondering if it was her warmth or light or just pure exhaustion that had kept the demons at bay. "Maybe I've just been missing you since then."

As he let that bombshell drop, a delicious twitch quivered along her lower lip, eyes widening before she sucked the chapped surface into her mouth and set her jaw again. He still didn't fully understand the attraction that sparked every time he looked at Brienne, perhaps it would fade with time, but he hoped her telling blushes would outlast whatever physical want existed between them. "Are we supposed to...I mean, I wanted to call, should we...should we go inside?"

"Why didn't you?" She looked back at him in question, the early morning sun just low enough to glint off her mop of messy blonde hair and grant her a temporary halo. "Call?"

Brienne shook her head like she was shedding lies and reasonable excuses, nervousness pinching along the lines of her face. "It was 4am, I had thirty seconds and I thought...I'm sorry."

"Say that on my voicemail next time. It'll almost be like you waking up with me."

"Almost," she echoed, subtle notes of warning and longing finding his ears from across the diminishing divide and leaving his heart stuttering back towards a normal rhythm with what was being left unsaid.

"Brienne," he tried as she held open the door to the cafe for a young couple, who openly stared at up her features while they laughed and whispered to each other. It was almost as if the little confidence she had in her abilities seeped from her pores as he watched the silent exchange, the words forming and falling from his mouth before he had time to think.

"You should thank the lady for her manners," Jaime snarled, tiptoeing towards the edge of dangerous. Brienne's eyes jumped between pleading and pissed off, the blue darkening like a roaring ocean beneath a thunderstorm. "While you inspect her like a zoo animal, you should count yourself lucky she's much too polite to shut that door in your face."

There was a brief impasse where all parties stayed frozen in the doorway, the longer they hovered, the more Brienne curled inwards and Jaime willed himself to trust in the width of his shoulders and the hidden threats in his tone. He knew what it felt like to be sized up on a near daily basis, knew that he was likely taller, stronger, and faster. So, he merely waited until the younger guy stepped out of the lion's den with his still gaping girlfriend in tow, mumbled apologies trailing in their wake. Satisfied, Jaime started to address his next comment to Brienne, only to discover she had shuffled away and taken a seat at an empty table in the far corner, as far from further attention as she could get.

"You didn't have to do that." Her voice greeted him from behind a laminated breakfast menu. "In fact, I'd prefer it if you don't again. I can look after myself and I know when to pick my battles."

"I know, it's one of the things I lo...like best about you. But I only said what was needed, no one should think they can treat you like that."

"It's okay," Brienne promised, letting him take the menu from her and replace it with his hand. "That was nothing," she shrugged, though it wasn't without some effort. "People can be cruel, I saw it last night and I'll see it again tonight but there's no harm done, Jaime, really. I'm okay."

He grimaced at her determined, though defeated, tone, unsure how best to move the conversation forward so that he could help. If the last couple of weeks had taught him anything, however, it was that Brienne had little skill in covering her reactions, so either he'd just discovered the one area she was better at hiding, or she had been knocked down too many times by rude and ignorant comments that it had gotten to a point where they bounced off her with little damage. Jaime wasn't sure which scenario would be worse, but the anger beginning to bubble through his blood led him straight back to the night of Tommen's accident and his own initial impression, a few choice phrases coming to mind.

"I'm sorry," he offered, the blanket apology accepted with a squeeze of his hand.

She lowered her head, leaning back in her seat and away from his touch, retreating a little as if afraid of his concern or misinterpreting it as pity. "Is it okay to order now? I need to get some coffee in me before I drop."

Jaime glanced down at the menu, picking the first thing listed and raising an eyebrow at her withering stare. "What?"

"That's a lot of food."

"And? You don't think I can eat that much? I can eat, Doc, just watch me."

She sighed and it was a glorious mix of exasperation and scepticism. "Breakfast isn't a competition, Jaime."

"It can't be if you're having something horribly sensible without any fat or fun."

"I've eaten here twice a week for four and a half years, I've tried everything on that menu and I know my favourites."

Jaime scoffed. "Poached eggs and whole wheat toast shouldn't be classed as your 'favourite'. You can make that at home. You need to enjoy the food here."

"How did you...? Fine," she huffed, crossing her arms as she stood up. "But, for fairness sake, you have to do something for me, too."

"Anything."

"You shouldn't be so eager to promise that, you don't know what I'm going to ask."

"It doesn't matter, you can ask me _anything_ ," he stretched out his legs, relaxing further into the cushioned seat to enable him to look up and up at her, dragging his eyes over the denim clinging to her thighs and the ugly, multi-coloured sweater squaring off any indication of curving musculature.

She blushed as his undivided attention became too much for her to handle, shuffling from one hip to the other, caught in the spotlight. "One of the boys in on the children's ward is turning eight next week and I was wondering if you'd mind asking your brother, since he owns the team, if Beric Dondarrion would mind dropping by the hospital."

Jaime couldn't say that it was exactly what he'd been expecting, or hoping, to be asked, but he was touched by Brienne's dedication to improving her patients' emotional state, nonetheless. "Yes."

"He wouldn't have to stay long and-"

"Yes."

"I'd pay for his time, of course, but it would make-"

"Yes."

"Edric's day?"

"For Seven's sake, Doc, yes. I know Beric personally. He’s married to the sister of my former partner and I'm sure he'd love to meet a fan. Totally free of charge."

The line reappeared between her brows, and he aimed his most charming smile up at her, weighing up his suggestion. "Really?"

"Yeah, he's a good guy. You'd like him."

"Thank you." She was so sweetly sincere, it made him ache all over, her buck-tooth smile the first he'd seen since waking up wrapped around her. "I'll...I'll just go and put this order in now," she stuttered, bobbing into a messily unnecessary half curtesy. Gods, he was falling hard for all her contradictions.

"And if there's anything else," he called after her, laughing at the wave of her hand, as if that could quieten him. "Just let me know."

Disappointedly she didn't, keeping him occupied with more talk about the day to day goings on at the hospital, focusing mainly on her sister's progress and the new group of nurses. But he liked hearing Brienne open up about a part of her life and so didn't interrupt until the food arrived. There was more than the menu had suggested, Brienne verging on smug from across the table as she dipped her fork through the river of hollandaise and into the yolk of one egg, licking a sunset of sauce off the prongs as he worked out how exactly to excavate his plate. It was Jaime's turn to feel uncomfortable, swallowing his strangled moan along with a bite of bacon as he watched her tongue dart and retreat, completely oblivious to the effect she was having on him.

A few quiet minutes later, when Jaime was a little over half way through his breakfast, an idea came to him. "I bet you're one of those people who give kids treats if they finish all their food."

"Have you already forgotten where I work?" she replied sternly around a mouthful of spinach. "It pays to be kind when they're in the process of recovering their strength. Usually it's just TV time but occasionally we have lollipops or something specific to each child."

Jaime smiled, aiming for understanding and arriving closer to conspiratorial. "What would you give _me_ if I ate all of this?"

"An antacid?"

"How about something a little sweeter?"

"I don't have any candy with me, Jaime, but you can buy a cookie from the counter."

"That's not what I meant," he replied gently, flirtatiously batting his eyelashes just enough to make her blush again and drop a forkful of eggs onto the monochrome tablecloth. "What if I cleared this plate and you kissed me right here, in front of all these people?"

"That's...that's not a treat," she reasoned, scrubbing at the burgeoning stain in front of her with a napkin. "We don't usually...we don't, just because we're s-sleeping," she stuttered and swallowed. "Slept together doesn't..."

"Is that what you've been thinking?"

Brienne raised her head, eyeing him with an undertone of nervous suspicion. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"You want a label for this? Fine," he dropped his cutlery, leaving the remaining food to cool as he leaned forward in order to garner her full attention. "I don't know what technically the right order should be for us, but that doesn't mean you're not my girlfriend." Jaime paused, hearing Tyrion's voice in his head and feeling a moment of self-doubt. "If you want."

"Oh...okay, yes, yes, I'd like that," Brienne answered with great haste, almost tripping over her tongue as a small and shy but unmistakable smile spread across her face, returning to her plate only when they both seemed to be more reassured in their affections. She kept sneaking glances at him though, some puzzled, some amazed, and he loved that she hadn't gotten her fill of him yet, checking that whatever he saw in her was genuine and unchanging.

She didn't stop looking, even as Jaime reached the point of not being able to move if he ate anything else, mentally preparing himself to gracelessly admit defeat. Suddenly Brienne reached across the table and speared the last, leftover sausage from his plate, biting into it.

"That's cheating," he teased, enjoying the possibility that was hanging in the air around them. "What kind of example is that to set?"

"Sometimes we reward the children for making a good effort," she licked the grease off her downturned lips, finally taking hold of his gaze again. "Do you want this or not?"

"Oh, I want it."

Shaking her head, Brienne pulled her chair further under the table and leaned across, pressing her lips to his for one one-thousand, two one-thousand, three one-thousand. Jaime was able to feel how her cheeks were burning as heads turned, and then, she was gone, leaving him wanting more.

"So," he breathed, feeling giddy enough to push his luck. "Same time Friday?"

"You'll get fat," she pointed out, studying him as she stacked the plates, tidying up for the people she'd clearly gotten to know over the years. "But I can't Friday, how about Monday instead? I might not be any fun at all by then, though."

"You don't eat at weekends?"

"Of course. I...I just thought you might want to spend more time with your family or have other things to do."

"I'd rather do _you_ ," he countered, revelling in being matter of fact when faced with her stuttering blushes.

"Do you like hockey?" Brienne blurted out. Nodding for her to continue, she addressed her next comments to the small stack of condiments in the corner of the table, rather than have to look directly at him. "I have some tickets for the game on Saturday. I'll need to be back at the hospital for six-thirty but I could pick you up about two?" Jaime nodded again, letting her talk. "And breakfast, maybe Monday _and_ Wednesday?"

Jaime laughed. "You're going to make this very difficult for me to be spontaneous and romantic."

"You could always pick me up instead, if that would be...better."

"In the Gryffin? I did say I'd take you for a ride someday."

"It's a hockey game, Jaime, not a movie premiere," she sighed, ducking her head to scribble something on a napkin before passing it to him. "I'll be at home but it shouldn't be too far out of your way. If you get lost, just call."

So he did.

It had been a long time since Jaime had attended any kind of sporting event and sat in the cheap seats. The few times he'd seen the Lions play had involved taking in the view from Tyrion's corporate box, drinks and lunch being provided, along with a hand picked waitress meant to answer his every whim. But, after folding into the restricted seating and retrieving a well loved beanie hat from his pocket, he couldn't say he minded the change of scenery. Certainly not when it seemed natural to wrap his arm around Brienne's shoulders, cuddling in close and stealing a kiss or two under the pretence of trying to stay warm as they watched her team eek out a narrow victory over the visiting side. Even more so than at breakfast, he enjoyed her company immensely, listening to her whisper team stats and drama whenever the action paused. And the readily reciprocated goodbye kisses in his car afterwards, making Jaime feel more like a teenager himself than someone with two moody ones intermittently using his apartment like a hotel, were just cherries on the top of a great day.

The following Sunday he took advantage of her changing shifts, a rare twenty four hours straight without patients, bringing Brienne to the freezing beach so that they could exert some energy, laughing and competing and running with an adoring Honor. His empty apartment became too much of a pull in the end, however, Jaime knowing how thinly veiled his invite was to 're-hydrate'. As soon as his front door closed, they were furiously making out anyway, delighted by her burst of boldness that had them falling onto his couch and staying there until he suggested moving things into the bedroom. Two weeks without that kind of physical connection felt like too long, for Brienne too, if the way she was crying out for him was anything to go by. With the way their work schedules were, and the kids, Jaime knew he had to savour every moment of seeing her in his world.

It took no effort at all on Jaime's part to persuade her to stay the night, slipping into the clean shirt he left out for her after showering and finding enough of a comfortable balance in his kitchen to help make dinner. Her cookery skills weren't much better than his, but they somehow managed to have a great deal of fun putting together a healthy, spicy tomato pasta dish. He asked her out again, while they were tidying up later, having to settle for a continuation of their breakfast dates and the promise that she'd be there for Tommen's move to the children's ward. Between preparing for an emergency medicine research conference, visits from his favourite cousins and some of her former med school colleagues, there wasn't much spare time to be alone together all week.

Jaime didn't see her so much at the hospital now either, just the occasional glimpse of a tall, broad form disappearing down a corridor or a blonde head looming above a crowd of quickly moving doctors, her brief smiles burning like looking directly into the sun. He'd also lost the opportunity to tease and question from afar, despite being pleased that Alys had finally been discharged with orders to stay away from physical exertion until her ribs had fully healed. Her sister's return to the shared school run came with the very real possibility of eating into their recently ring fenced time, too. He understood why Brienne had to prioritise things that way but that didn't mean he had to enjoy it. At least she started calling every couple of days, returning his messages, sometimes only to say hello and check how things were at home, others to ask him to talk her to sleep, too on edge from events to calm down by herself, and once to admit how much she missed seeing him. He even convinced her, blush by blush and sigh by sigh, that phone sex would help them both relax.

It was a temporary measure, but one that got him through another week and a half of rushed conversations and missed opportunities, eventually carving out two evenings in a row to reconnect and re-introduce each other to three inquisitive girls. Myrcella, Arianne, and Alysanne seemed to enjoy the hour he'd booked out for them at the rink, the youngest full of smiles and chatter, despite still being in her cast, Brienne keeping an equally close eye on him and her sisters as they glided round and round. He loaded everyone up on sugar afterwards, hot chocolate out of paper cups, answering questions about time management and living arrangements and marriage, while Brienne turned crimson at the very suggestion, right up until Myrcella declared them a perfect match on the drive home.

He made love to Brienne in her own bed that night, for the first time. She was initially surprised to find him on her doorstep after they'd already said goodnight, a little hesitant over inviting him into the safety of her sanctuary, but Brienne didn't turn him away when he asked for time to talk. Her old sofa was amazingly comfortable to fall onto and work through some of his frustrations of the last month, Brienne fighting past her own fears that he was growing bored or impatient or simply needed more than she could give, talking and bickering well into the small hours of the morning until they almost fully understood each other. It was Brienne who initiated the kissing that time, gentle and tender, nothing conniving or manipulative in the act that took him to her bed, and he fell deeper in love surrounded by the little things that made up her life outside of the hospital, things that few had been allowed close enough to find out.

In the morning, though her alarm went off much too early, to his great delight, Brienne didn't baulk or bolt or hide from the way he was gazing, lovingly, if a little bleary eyed, across at her, choosing to keep his distance until she inevitably closed it. And almost better than those quiet moments of acceptance was her shy insistence that if, and only if, Tyrion was around to keep an eye on things or Myrcella had a sleepover to go to, then Jaime was welcome to stay with her. With that caveat, he didn't think there would be time for repeat performances on a regular basis but the open invitation did give Jaime an unexpected chance later that week to witness her unguarded reactions to the dress the Tyrell girl had put together for Brienne's appearance at the Foundation ball.

Patience wasn't normally in his vocabulary but in the remaining time leading up to the event he'd had great fun teasing and cajoling her at the end of each date, including throughout a day mostly spent in bed. Jaime, deep down, didn't really mind waiting, not even when her working pattern shifted back to nights, leaving them both more secure in the knowledge that they were on a similar page romantically, and Tommen was released into his care a few days before the charity celebrations.

Myrcella was back at his place full time now, too, following a fight with her mother than he hadn't wanted to be put in the middle of, but somehow had ended up in that position anyway. Cersei would likely disappear for several months to lick her wounds and regroup after Jaime had done what felt like the right thing, standing up for Cella. She’d come back from Dorne or Yi Ti or some other supposed paradise only when it best suited her image and intentions.

But, for now, he had the Tarth Foundation ball to attend, Christmas with the kids, and hopefully Brienne to look forward to, his life finally approaching a semblance of normality as he approached middle age. And, as Jaime found himself once again in the cruel purgatory that was a hospital waiting room, he was left to wonder how none of the things that were making him happy could have been predicted by those closest to him. At least this time he was there with a laughing Tommen, currently introducing his new stuffed animal to those left out for visiting children in the waiting area, while Myrcella helped the youngest members of the Tarth family transform Brienne from hospital resident to hospitable heiress.

His mind had just started to wander when he heard Myrcella purposely clear her throat from the other side of the emptying room, her Lannister green eyes flashing with an unspoken warning while she fluffed the underskirts of her vintage party dress. "Brienne's a little nervous," she began carefully. "The dress isn't what she was expecting."

"Don't worry, I won't laugh," he promised, watching his niece cock her head in disbelief. "Well I might, but not for long, I..."

"Love her," Myrcella filled in, hastily glancing down the corridor and back to him and her brother. "You should try telling Brienne that once in a while, not me."

Uncharacteristically hesitating, Jaime's pause stretched as he caught sight of Brienne shuffling towards him at speed, swathed in satiny cornflower blue. It was the first thing that he had seen on her that just about fit, though the dress couldn't be described as entirely flattering to her broad shoulders and flat chest. The split that went half way up her thigh made the most of her one of her best assets, revealing miles of freckled skin that was going to be distracting depending on how many drinks he was going to need to stay as civil as possible all night.

Niggling at the back of his mind, though, were the other guests. Cersei didn't have friends per se, but several of her close circle, girls he'd grown up with who still wanted nothing more than to maul him in the bathroom, were attending and could go out of their way to make things uncomfortable for him and especially for Brienne.

"Hey," he breathed, springing out of his seat and bounding into range of her glare like an over exuberant puppy. "Remind me to send your friend a gift basket, Doc, blue is a great colour on you. You look..."

"Stop it," she demanded, cutting him off before he could say something inappropriate. Brienne ran her hands over his shoulders, smoothing the perfectly pressed tux jacket and straightened his bow tie. "I know fine well what I look like, there's no need to point it out."

"You look _good_ ," he grinned, grateful that Cella had had the foresight to round up the kids and take them barely out of sight to buy candy bars as he purposely pressed his lips once to the softness under Brienne's jaw. "Though I think I prefer you in your scrubs or nothing at all."

She made a strangled noise that was more nervously scandalised than agreeable and, with a glance to the oversized clock keeping track of every painfully passing second, Jaime let go of her waist and stepped away. "I have something to ask you later but there's a surprise waiting outside and it should be set up for you all by now."

"I really don't like surprises, Jaime. It kind of comes with the territory here."

"Don't worry, Doc, nobody has been or will be harmed. Besides, this is more for the kids than you."

She snorted just loud enough to disturb the couple burying their bowed heads in the inanity of abandoned gossip magazines, glaring from their corner of shaky solitude, forced to witness content, comfortable moments while working through their own layers of despair. When she realised what she had done, Brienne's apologies fell from her tongue without a second. He wondered, as she deftly ushered him away, how many times a day she had to repeat the process, how long before she became jaded and her honour was another casualty in this labyrinth of swirling nightmares, innocence and experience remaining at odds.

"As I was saying," she continued as they walked together to wait for yet another elevator. "There's not one of them you need to win brownie points from. " _Everybody_ loves you."

"Everyone?" he quirked an eyebrow and she immediately switched to reading the mile long hospital directory printed between the series of imposing metal doors, choosing to control the blush creeping up her neck the best she could. He reached for her hand as the cavernous space opened to them, entwining their fingers as if it was second nature, while keeping a tight hold of Tommen's wheelchair on his other side. The little boy would only be staying for a few hours at the party. It was early in his recovery and he still needed more rest than usual, Aunt Genna coming to pick him up with the promise that she could also meet the woman who'd turned Jaime's head so dramatically. And when he did so now, glancing up at her through his eyelashes, just in case he'd catch Brienne looking in return, she was humming softly to herself, mellow and melancholy and instantly recognisable, _It's the sound of the unlocking and the lift away, your love will be, safe with me_.

"You might want to close your eyes for this bit," he told the younger three members of his audience, not missing the fleeting, though long suffering, look passing between Cella and Brienne. "But don't feel you have to just to humour me."

"Jaime," she chastised, doing her best not to subtly sigh or shake her head. "Whatever you're trying to prove here can you hurry up. This is a working hospital, in case you've forgotten."

"Come on then, kind sir and gentle ladies." He received another snort of barely controlled incredulity from Brienne as he started to lead them out into the crisply frosted night. "Follow me."

*******

Brienne would have liked to wrap her arms around herself as she stepped from the relative warmth she'd spent the last twelve hours growing accustomed to and into the cold, clear air. But both of her sisters had bought into Jaime's rousing ringleader routine, giving her barely enough time to button her coat before she was all but dragged away.

Her breath caught as Annie dropped her hand and swiftly skipped after their overexcited sibling, a horse drawn carriage standing in an eerily empty corner of the parking lot, breath steaming from the nostrils of the matched pair of pure white ponies. It all looked like something out of the book of fanciful fairy tales that had been passed from sister to sister over the last decade.

"Does it turn back into a pumpkin at midnight?" she stage whispered to Jaime, who'd settled comfortably at her side, keeping one eye on the children at all times. "Should I be concerned about my shoes?"

"Very funny, Doc," he drawled. "And even if it did, didn't you call ahead and book us a room for tonight?"

Brienne blushed, the heat dissipating from her skin almost immediately, finding a purpose in the cold kiss of winter.

"I'm in love with your cheeks whenever you do that."

She reached for a retort as he ran his eyes over her face, searching for something to push him back from his wisecracking, teasing comfort zone but her last case of the day had left an impression, another 'what if' weighing heavily over her even as she'd helped retrieve two bullets from the shoulder of a street cop. She hadn't spoken a word to Jaime despite feeling, knowing, realising she'd been falling for weeks. "I'm in love with _you_."

Jaime blinked but didn't show any other obvious outward signs that he was faltering from the power of her declaration. _He must have known._ "Spend Christmas morning with me," he gently demanded in reply, pleading and persuasive. "I love you. I want you there to open presents and bake cookies..."

"You bake?" Brienne asked incredulously, she'd done everything over the past couple of weeks to beg, borrow, and swap shifts just to have three days off over the holidays.

"Mimosas and cookie dough then?"

"If you don't mind spending time together on Christmas Eve instead, we could celebrate a day early, all day," she offered, rushing to an explanation before he could offer up a word in complaint. "I like to go to my dad's for lunch and the girls like me there first thing, too."

" _I_ like the sound of that," he smiled, his cheeks dimpling as she watched. "I've never had two Christmases before."

Alys called out to her before he could move to kiss her again, sealing the deal or waking her from a dream. Brienne stepped forward, allowing the gentle giant of a horse to blow warm air onto her palms as Jaime lifted Tommen into the carriage, settling him down and offering her Brienne a helping hand, one which she refused.

The journey across the city was nicer than she'd let herself expect, remaining bitterly cold in the carriage, though the view outweighed the temporary discomfort, street after street sparkling under a vaguely starry sky. Brienne stayed quiet while those around her didn't, until the Marbrand hotel sprung up on the horizon like it had been hiding in plain sight, looming closer and closer until she could see had no other option but to accept her father really was standing in the entrance, greeting the incoming guests. At the sound of the carriage, he turned and immediately caught sight of the handsome man by his daughter’s side, before he was distracted by the group of them stepping to the sidewalk.

Trying to warn Jaime of what he might be walking in to, she only managed to send a single sharp word his way before the two men were shaking hands and Jaime's name was tripping off her tongue, stumbling over introductions. Her father had to know who Jaime was, but even if Selwyn did, he was doing an excellent job of pretending otherwise.

"So you're a doctor, too?"

"Detective."

"And how did you meet again?" Selwyn enquired sternly, looking between the pair. His usual line of questioning generally didn't go past if she was on track to be chief resident in a couple of years or her thoughts after reading an emergency medicine journal, but throwing Jaime into the mix, even at his most charming, seemed to be igniting a protective instinct he hadn't shown before. Though it wasn't as if he was against the idea of her dating, she'd never forgiven him for persuading her to go out with Red Ron back in the early days of medical school. Hyle, too, had come with his prior approval, after the pair had crossed paths at a conference, and look how well that had all turned out.

"Dad," she started, hating the whine that was creeping into her tone. "There are people here who've been travelling for hours just to shake your hand. They need to put a face to the name, surely we can discuss this later."

"Practical," Jaime whispered, knocking his shoulder against hers and smiling like he had hundreds of secrets he had no intention of sharing. Picking up her hand again, he cocked his head and told the truth. "Well, I met her at the blood bank..."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I met you at the blood bank  
> We were looking at the bags  
> Wondering if any of the colors  
> Matched any of the names we knew on the tags  
> You said "see look, that's yours  
> Stacked on top with your brother's  
> See how they resemble one another  
> Even in their plastic little covers"  
> And I said I know it well
> 
> That secret that you knew  
> But don't know how to tell  
> It fucks with your honor  
> And it teases your head  
> But you know that it's good, girl  
> 'Cause its running you with red
> 
> Then the snow started falling  
> We were stuck out in your car  
> You were rubbing both of my hands  
> Chewing on a candy bar  
> You said "ain't this just like the present  
> To be showing up like this"  
> As a moon waned to crescent  
> We started to kiss  
> And I said I know it well
> 
> That secret that we know  
> That we don't know how to tell  
> I'm in love with your honor  
> I'm in love with your cheeks  
> What's that noise up the stairs, babe?  
> Is that Christmas morning creaks?  
> And I said I know it well

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!


End file.
